


Spooktacular Shorts

by MissSparklingWriter



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-02
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-11-22 03:02:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20867126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissSparklingWriter/pseuds/MissSparklingWriter
Summary: A string of random shorts for Marvel's Spooktober event.





	1. Spirits of Halloween

**Author's Note:**

> I will try and get these up on the correct day or as close to it as possible.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The dare? Spend at least four hours in a cemetery on the creepiest night of the year. But Darcy is about to find more than just some tombstones...

It is often thought that, at 28 years old, one should know better than to agree to stay in a cemetery at night, all for a dare.

Darcy had long graduated from college and so could not blame the impulsiveness and sense of adventure that students are often attributed with. She also had plenty of life experience, enough to reason that such a thing was outside the boundaries for sensible behaviour. But then Darcy Lewis had not always been sensible and, whether 28 or 18, there were few bigger thrills than being dared to stay in a cemetery for many hours of the night, on Halloween. Dares between friends knew no boundaries of age. She and Keira continually dared each other even now and Darcy had no doubt they would still be exchanging dares when they were 70.

Darcy had already made sure her phone was on 100% battery and she had her power bank with her in her shoulder satchel. For maximum effect, it was agreed that she would go to the cemetery once the streets were quieter from trick or treaters. She and Keira watched a couple of movies in the afternoon and hit up the local bar afterwards for Halloween themed cocktails. Several Bloody Marys and other concoctions later, Darcy found herself walking through the gates of the cemetery.

She’d dressed as Rumplestiltskin from Once Upon A Time. (Finding suitable clothing for that outfit had not been easy and the face paint had never been used thanks to the movies and the pre-bar cocktails.) The outfit offered her some protection from the mid autumn chill that prodded at her exposed face.

The sky was as cloudless and starry as though it had been ordained in prophecy that Darcy would need such conditions for this dare. Even better was the full moon that hung openly and brightly above the earth. Its silvery light danced along the graves and statuesque tombstones that reached prominently into the night. The gate was old iron and it creaked and scratched against the pathway as Darcy entered. There were many trees spread in small clumps around the graveyard, all of them leafless with spidery branches reaching out into the chill air.

Darcy looked around the place approvingly. “This is wicked,” she murmured to herself as she lifted her phone, activated selfie mode and turned on the camera.

“Happy Halloween, peoples!” she gave a small wave to the camera. “Welcome to another installment of Darcy always rises to the dare. Shoutout to my main girl, Keira, for at least making this one fun.” She turned the camera around, giving it a good view of the cemetery. “This is the Francesca Lawrence cemetery. I don’t know how flattering it is to have a cemetery named after you but okay.” She returned the camera to selfie mode. “The goal, ladies, gentleman and everyone else, is for yours truly to spend at least four hours out here tonight in this lovely location.” She began to walk down the pathway, deeper into the cemetery, as she deactivated selfie mode again.

The graves near the iron fencing were smaller, consisting of stones that weren’t much bigger than a small suitcase. The wording on the tombs ranged in styles from neat rows of trim lettering to more ancient, chicken scratch kind of writing. As Darcy followed the path along, many of the graves followed these styles. Every so often, she passed by a stone statue depicting a person in some dignified pose, or some animals that was intended to be symbolic. As the minutes passed, Darcy took in the view of these and occasionally passed comment on them. There was one statue with a man stood in front of a bird taking flight. (”I’m sorry but that’s just Dumbledore in the Order of the Phoenix, escaping Fudge with Fawkes.”) Another one had two crocodiles curved around a raised square depicting the names of a family. (”I mean that’s cool if crocs are your thing.”) Further on, she began to notice that more and more of these stones were dark marble ones with more formal lettering styles. She read the names of a couple of lords and mayors as she passed.

*******

“Fun, spooky fact for you viewers,” Darcy said as she stood underneath a large thick-trunked tree that stood atop a short hill, about a ten minute walk from the cemetery entrance. The shadows of the graves were now completely around her. “Francesca Lawrence died exactly a year after this cemetery was dedicated to her. And, I did my research. They named this place after her because she treated her patients so well that loads of them lived longer lives than other doctors said they would. She didn’t give up on them and they had all this extra time cause of it. Awww, that’s pretty cool, right? We can see if she’s buried here. Be kinda weird if she wasn’t.”

She filmed a great shot of everything in front of her and then switched back to selfie mode. “All right folks, time to head deeper into the unknown,” she made sure to add a kinda spooky storyteller voice as she walked around the tree, turning as she moved, to face the rest of the cemetery. “Better keep a watch out for ghosts-” The phone slid from her fingers, falling into the slippery grass, a muffled crack barely audible as Darcy looked out at the rest of the cemetery.

“Holy fuck,” Darcy murmured. She had always known that Francesca Lawrence Cemetery was big. You only had to walk a little ways into it to see that. But the size of it wasn’t what captured Darcy’s attention so.

It was the hundreds of silvery, luminescent figures that were walking in, out and around the gravestones. Bright, beautiful figures, gliding off the ground and shimmering in the moonlight. They moved around each other, some of them talking, some of them just gliding by, minding their own business. It was like watching an ordinary crowd of people at the mall, only these were glowing and hovering at least a foot off the ground.

_How much did I have to drink?_ Darcy wondered. _It had to be the drink right?_ It was Halloween. She was just seeing things wasn’t she? She was hallucinating. Maybe someone spiked her drink? But she didn’t feel disorientated or giddy or high or any of the weird sensations she might have felt if she’d been drugged. She felt sober and alert. She could feel the stillness in the air and the refreshing chill against her cheeks as she stood there, on the hill, staring down at this crowd of ghosts.

A feeling of ice moved fast through Darcy’s chest. Her cry of surprise was swallowed up by a sudden, desperate need for air in her lungs as her chest constricted under the cold. Suddenly breathing seemed harder, unnatural, unreachable. The sensation only lasted a second and a silver presence moved out of her chest and began drifting down the hill towards the other ghosts. Darcy sagged back against the tree, her breathing returning to normal.

“Fucking rude,” she called out, hanging onto a tree branch with one hand, her other clutching the trunk.

The ghost turned around and Darcy got her first good look at a tall, broad shouldered, overweight man. He was very well dressed in tunic, pants and cape that were all fastened with shining buckles and buttons and held up by a belt with glittering jewels on. He wore a great wide hat with a feather sticking proudly from it. No hair could be seen from under it. Had a wide, potato like face and small eyes, matched with a thin smile that looked familiar to Darcy. In one hand, he held a walking stick. A posh one, Darcy could tell even without the colours, the glittering ball atop the actual stick gave that away. She remembered why he looked so familiar. For a second, she was transported back into her history lessons.

“You’re Henry the Eighth!” she blurted out.

The ghosts’ eyes narrowed sourly. “That is King Henry to you.”

“You weren’t my King,” Darcy countered.

The ghost scowled. “Insolent brat. I would have had your head if I was still alive.”

“I’m sure you would. That was your hobby wasn’t it? Killing people. “Oh look it’s Wednesday and I’m bored. I know! I’ll lop off someone’s head!”” Darcy didn’t know where the confidence came from but the words flowed out of her with a kind of energizing anger to them. “And now I’m a ghost, I’ll just walk through people instead of around them because I’m rude like that.”

Henry looked no less annoyed as he surveyed her. “A spirited child, I see.” He mused. “I can’t expect you to understand Kingship. You are both a child and a woman.”

“And there we go,” Darcy gestured to him with both hands, “there’s the sexism. Bravo, your Majesty,” Darcy made sure that her curtsey was especially sarcastic, adding in an eye roll for effect as she crossed her ankles and dipped down, her hands reaching out for imaginary skirts. “In 500 years, you didn’t get any more progressive in the afterlife.”

Was she really having a conversation with one of the most infamous English kings of all time? Everything seemed real enough. Maybe, Darcy thought, she could film it and watch it tomorrow. She remembered her fallen phone. Her gaze shifted down to the grass nearby. She reached down to pick it up. There, across the front, was a great crack in the screen, which was now black. Darcy briefly thought about Keira and the dare. But those thoughts soon flew from her mind as Henry addressed her again.

“I’d hardly call this progress. England has lost its monarchy, you Americans have shied away from it and the world still has wars and plenty of injustice. There are more religions than you could shake a stick at and now you have terrorists attacking your cities and civilians outside of war. You have your own people marching into places and opening fire. Tell me, how is your world better than the one I came from?”

Darcy stifled a growl. She didn’t want to admit that some of what he’d said had some merit. “I didn’t say it was perfect, just progressive. Women aren’t treated like second class citizens. They have a voice, they have power and they have freedom.”

“It’s unnatural,” Henry said. “The world was fine as it was. Bar this indoor plumbing and unusual travel methods you have invented.”

“Well duh, anything beats throwing a chamber pot out of the window.”

“You speak so much on the attack of me,” Henry said as he looked around at the other ghosts. “These are my kind. It seems you are the intruder here. We spirits may walk where we please. The earth no longer limits us.” He looked down at the cane in his hand. “Why you mortals insist on remembering me this way, as an old man, I don’t know. In the last years of my life, I dreamed of being the young man I was once more.”

Darcy stepped away from the tree, folding her arms, hearing the squeaking sound of her leather costume rubbing together as she did. “Yeah well that’s karma and vanity for you. You were vain enough to have that certain portrait taken and you’re pretty infamous for everything you did. Of course that’s how we remember you.”

Henry’s eyes stared into hers intently. “Everything I did was to make sure England was not left without an heir. I had many subjects to think of, a family line to leave behind.”

“Yeah? Those same people you had killed for all sorts of reasons? Like not conforming to your religion?” Darcy countered. “Nothing justifies that. If there is a God, he’s not going to be impressed is he?”

“What do you mean, if?” Henry shot back. “You dare to question the existence of our Lord, you heretic?” His voice grew angrier. Darcy had no trouble imagining him shouting for someone to take her to the Tower. “The Lord knows that sacrifices have to be made. The Great Flood proved that.”

Darcy laughed coldly. “Oh you think? You wonder why I don’t believe in him? A God that would wipe out all the world but a few people, just to start again? That’s like a child tipping over a game board because they’re losing.”

“Insolent child!” Henry raised his hand. Darcy flinched even though deep down, she knew he couldn’t touch her. It was still a horrid sensation as his hand passed through her.

“You’re so blind, so ignorant,” Darcy said as she side stepped out of his reach. “You ruined all those lives just to have a son. Your daughter, Elizabeth, was a badass Queen. She did amazing as a ruler, without needing a pair of balls.”

Henry stiffened up. He frowned at Darcy wordlessly for a moment. “Just who do you think you are, saying such things to me? Who are you, of note? You’re not royalty, you’re not one of your government agents, you are not important. So tell me why I should regard the words of a stupid, insignificant girl?”

Darcy tried to ignore the sting of those words. “I don’t care if you listen. I just thought you should know you’re a grade A dick.”

“And you are misguided if you do not think I can harm you,” Henry answered, gliding towards her. “Your words will cost you dearly, child.”

Darcy was going to challenge him on that, ask him what harm could a ghost do. But then she remembered the sensation of him passing through her, how quickly she began to have troubles with her breathing. If he did that to her again, for longer. Jeez, when had this night turned into something of a scary movie?

She retreated away from him. “Your people might have just taken that shit and let it happen. I’m not them. See ya.” Darcy spun round and in seconds she was running from him.

Not concentrating on the location, she set off, racing along the grassy space between rows of tombstones. She followed the curve of the row as it led deeper into the graveyard. There were so many ghosts around, Darcy had to try and avoid running through them as she darted away from Henry. Some of them looked over at her, watching the chase. Her cheeks burned with humiliation and fear. Why did weird shit have to happen to her?

Glancing back once, she saw Henry’s ghost catching up on her, his face prominent in front of a tail of ghostly energy, like a comet. She thought of the show Goosebumps she loved as a kid, and the episode with the ghost of Hill House, how the ghost had chased everyone out. She’d always hated that moment, the way it had gripped her heart, the way it had sent all her senses into a panic as if she was the one being chased. This was a thousand times worse. She knew what he’d do if he caught her. She could feel her heart pounding loud and erratic in her chest. Sweat burst from her, pouring down her face and arms as she ran.

Her foot caught against something hard in the ground, possibly a stone. Darcy didn’t get a chance to see what it was.

Her heart thrashed and terror flooded into her afresh as she hurtled forward. A ghost crossed her path as she fell. She felt the horrendous cold pass through her. When she landed, she landed hard on her front, the breath knocked out of her as she bounced onto her side. This allowed her to see Henry’s ghost bearing down on her. Darcy rolled to her right, knocking a vase of flowers over. Water and petals spilled out onto her hand and the front of the grave she’d just landed on. The whole right side of her body turned ice cold as Henry’s ghost whooshed past her. She scrambled to her feet and broke into a run again, this time cutting through the gravestones, crossing row by row, still trying to avoid passing through ghosts where she could.

When she looked back, Henry had turned in her direction and was quickly gaining on her again. But that near miss had been enough to tell Darcy one thing. He couldn’t turn easily, he moved too fast. Knowing what she had to do, Darcy turned sharply and ran to the right instead, building up speed as she rejoined the designated stone pathway. A howl of rage and frustration echoed across the cemetery behind her. At least one the stone pathway, there were less ghosts. They seemed more inclined to stay near the graves, or these ones were just being considerate and getting out of the way.

Darcy reached a stone crossroad and turned left sharply. This pathway led down into a large number of marble statues and mausoleums. It was also immensely overcrowded with ghosts. Darcy felt dizzy at the thought of running through them all. The idea hit her sharply like the ice bucket challenge. Maybe she could get lost in the ghosts and if she could hide herself… It gave her a feeling of hope. It might not work but she had to try.

Her sides were aching from all the running and Darcy took in as deep a breath as she could muster before plunging into the sea of ghostly mist. Her insides were consumed by cold and in those first seconds, she couldn’t see a thing. The shapes of the huge statues and massive mausoleums came into view. Darcy chanced a look back. She couldn’t distinguish him from the crowds. Heart still hammering and panic still trying to take over her mind, Darcy followed her gut’s instinct to dive to the right. She hit the floor next to a mausoleum. Struggling to catch her breath, she crawled towards the back of the mausoleum and scooted behind it. There were no ghosts here and soon the air began to fill her lungs again. Relief spread through her legs as her body began to understand that she had finally stopped. She covered her mouth with one hand, listening for Henry’s voice.

She could hear the chatter of nearby conversations but there was no growling or yelling or anything to indicate that Henry was nearby. Still, Darcy stayed where she was, hugging her knees close to her chest and waiting.

*******

Darcy’s eyes flickered open and she soon realised she must have passed out. She almost had a heart attack when she saw a ghost crouched down before her.

Like Henry, this ghost was familiar. She looked to be just a bit older than Darcy. She had warm brown eyes and a kind of regal face. She was wearing a suit and Darcy recognised the SSR logo discreetly attached to one of the lapels on her jacket by way of a pin.

“You’re all right now,” a strong English accent appeared in the ghost’s voice, “just catch your breath. No harm is going to come to you.”

Darcy straightened up a little, examining the woman closely. “You’re Agent Peggy Carter,” she said.

The ghost nodded with a smile. “Yes.”

“I read your file in Shield,” Darcy added by way of explanation. “I mean… wow… just wow. You were like one of the best heroes. Everything you did for the SSR and Howard Stark.” She swallowed. “I didn’t even know you’d died.” As she spoke the words, Darcy felt sick with shame. One of the greatest female legacies this world had known and Darcy had never even found out about her death. She felt her cheeks heat up.

“Thank you. My death was some time ago,” Peggy said. “I was losing parts of myself, deteriorating. In a way it’s a relief to feel myself again, completely. I’ve got to see a lot of old friends as well.” She smiled at Darcy. “You were very brave, yourself. Henry has a foul temper. I’ve had a few words with him myself over the last few years.”

Darcy laughed softly. She had absolutely no trouble believing that.

She closed her eyes, welcoming the peace that now surrounded her. She could hear more voices around her but not as many as before. She opened her eyes and looked back at Peggy who was still crouched, watching her. “So… is this your home?” Darcy asked, awkwardness taking over her.

Peggy shook her head, still smiling as if she was amused by the question. “No. Spirits don’t really belong anywhere. But on Halloween we can haunt the earth. Many ghosts choose to gather in places like this. So it’s nice to have company. Two of the SSR agents I knew were buried here.” She looked at Darcy. “What brought you here tonight?”

Darcy found that the story of her escapade tonight came easier to her lips than she thought. She explained the dare to Peggy and, as she did, she realised how childish that must sound to a woman with Peggy’s experiences. But, to Darcy’s surprise, Peggy laughed a little.

“Well I would say that you’ve gone above and beyond what was expected.”

Darcy snickered. “Not that anyone will believe me.”

“Yes but you’ll know and that’s what’s important,” Peggy said. She looked around the edge of the mausoleum. “Henry is gone for now. But you should head to another part of the cemetery if you want to avoid him.”

“What if he comes back?” Darcy asked, feeling a lot like a frightened five-year-old right about now.

“Just shout and someone will come and help. They’re not all like Henry. Hopefully he’s moved onto another place now. But be careful,” Peggy began to rise up.

Darcy reluctantly pulled herself up too. “Thanks,” she told Peggy. “It was… an honour to meet you.”

“It’s been an honour to meet you too,” Peggy said. “Take care of yourself, Darcy. The world needs more people like you in it.”

Darcy bowed her head, trying to minimise the heat spreading through her cheeks. When she looked up, Peggy was gone.

*******

Thankfully Darcy didn’t run into Henry as she continued to walk around the cemetery. She left the section of mausoleums and statues behind. Many of the ghosts that hung around there kept to themselves. Darcy recognised some pilgrims, some knights and a couple of celebrities there too. (She could have sworn one of them was Michael Jackson but she wasn’t sure.)

In the meantime, she managed to get her phone to turn on again. The video had been cut off when she’d dropped the phone but she deleted the footage. It was maybe not a good thing to try and film these guys. For one thing, did ghosts even show up on camera? For another, would people freak out if they saw this? Would they stampede the place trying to see them? It didn’t really seem like anything the ghosts needed, to be mobbed by the living. At the same time, Darcy felt selfish for keeping this a secret.

She continued to agonize over it for fifteen minutes as she walked towards the church at the back of the cemetery. It was an old, red slate roofed building and the doors were both open wide as Darcy neared it. Inside she could see ghosts lining up in the pews. She hovered outside the door. It seemed so strange that ghosts would go to church. It didn’t speak volumes about what life was like after death though.

“I’ve thought about going in too,” a young, male voice spoke from somewhere nearby. Darcy looked to her right. Alongside the church was a tall brick wall. A young man, maybe about high school age, was sitting on it, looking over at the church. Darcy’s eyes quickly blew up into saucers when she recognised the red and blue design of the Spiderman suit. The boy smiled down at her as he saw her reaction. “Yeah, I’m Spiderman,” he said as he leaped down onto the floor. “My real name’s Peter Parker.”

Darcy couldn’t speak. It wasn’t just that she hadn’t expected to meet Spiderman. It was several things at once. She hadn’t expected him to be so young. He was just a boy.

“How old were you?” she asked quietly.

“Sixteen,” Peter answered.

Darcy’s face fell. Sixteen was no age. But unfortunately that horrendous snap had taken away people far younger away from the world. Darcy had lost a few good friends, two uncles, a grandmother and six cousins to it. It was an event that should never have taken place and would never truly make sense. How people have been chosen, if they had been chosen. How those left behind had to deal with it. Whether anything like this would happen again. Living with the uncertainty that something on that scale could happen.

She finally swallowed. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

He nodded but Darcy could see emotions welling up behind his eyes. “It’s okay. I’m used to it.”

“It’s not okay,” Darcy insisted. “It’s just… totally wrong. You should have led a full life. You should have got to go to college, to get married, to have a job…”

“Yeah. But so should a lot of people,” Peter said with a sad smile. “My uncle Ben was shot. He still had years ahead of him. It’s just one of those thin- ” he clenched his fists in his hands as he cut himself off. He breathed out. “Okay, no, I mean with me, this was Thanos. This was just him mass murdering. It sucks. It really does. I had so much I wanted to do. But I can’t change that right now. I… I didn’t even get to say goodbye. It’s just like in those films… I didn’t want it to be like in them. Aunt May…”

Darcy regretted opening her mouth. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

He shook his head vigorously. “No it- it’s fine, really. I just… I just can’t help being angry.” He began to pace slowly in front of the wall, kicking at the ground, inches below his feet. Darcy watched his shimmering light pass through the dark blades of grass. He looked over at Darcy. “It’s been so long since I talked to a living person.” He stopped and looked at Darcy. “Are you visiting someone?”

Darcy wished that that was why she was here. There was a hollowness to her stomach now, like it had been emptied of all her courage and bravado. How stupid was it, that she’d come in here for a dare? Something so trivial compared to what people like Peter had gone through. “Not exactly,” she admitted. “It’s a Halloween dare,” her voice was sheepish. “Spend four hours in a cemetery.”

Peter grinned. “Yeah? That’s so cool!” he enthused. “How long have you been in?”

“Uh,” Darcy looked at her phone, “about an hour and a half.” She didn’t mention that she had fallen asleep for some of it after a manic chase with Henry VIII. “I was supposed to film it but the phone broke. Typical,” she continued with a small smile.

“That sucks,” Peter agreed. “But hey I really like your costume. Is that Rumplestiltskin?” he asked as he looked her over. “Excellent job. You didn’t want to do the face?”

“Cocktails interrupted,” Darcy explained. A lot of cocktails, she thought to herself.

“Well it looks great. He’s actually one of my favourite characters,” Peter enthused. He suddenly shook himself. “Sorry, I never got your name.” He held out his hand and for a moment, Darcy reached for it. They both remembered, before they could get much further and so their hands dropped.

“I’m Darcy. It’s good to meet you,” she said and then regretted it. Was it good to say it was good to meet a ghost? Was that like saying you were glad they were dead? “I mean,” Darcy backtracked, “well you know what I mean.”

Peter laughed a little. “It’s okay.”

It’s really not, Darcy thought again. This guy is so sweet.

She looked back up at Peter again. “You know, I still can’t believe Spiderman is so young,” she murmured.

Peter rubbed the back of his neck. “Why? Cause I seem older?” His eyes looked hopeful. He was like a puppy in human form.

“Yeah, something like that,” Darcy didn’t have the heart to knock that idea out of his head.

“Cool,” Peter said. He looked around at all the ghosts. “So, what do you think? Talk about spooktacular right? All these ghosts. I never believed in them before. You know, before I was one of them.”

Darcy joined him in gazing around. “It’s really bizarre,” she said, “like really kinda freaky how many of them there are.”

“That’s because ghosts haven’t been normalized like the Avengers,” Peter explained.

Darcy couldn’t help but laugh. “To be fair, the Avengers are pretty obviously real.”

“Yeah but Thor was just a myth until like seven years ago,” Peter argued. “Now people know the truth and he’s normalized.”

Darcy shoved her hands in her pockets. “Yeah, well I can’t be the only living person in this cemetery right now. I can’t be the only person seeing you.”

“I don’t know. But even if there is, who’s gonna believe people who claim to have seen ghosts? People have been doing that for years and nobody gets believed. No offence.”

“No it’s fine,” Darcy shoved her hands into her pockets. “It’s nothing I didn’t already know,” she added. If she was truly honest with herself, she wasn’t sure she even wanted to talk about the crazy that was this night. She watched as ghosts, led by a spirit priest, began to lead the ghosts out of church and around the back of it. Darcy looked around the church. There was a small garden beyond and ghosts were quietly gliding into it. She looked back at the empty church, feeling weirdly sad as she looked into it.

“Hey have you got the time?” Peter suddenly asked. Darcy checked her phone.

“Half twelve.”

“Half twelve?” Peter slammed his hand against his head. It was bizarre to watch his own hand pass through his head. “I’m sorry. I gotta go. I said I’d meet Uncle Ben in Brooklyn at midnight. Man he’s gonna be pissed.”

“Oh, okay-” Darcy began to say.

“It was really nice to meet you!” Peter declared as he turned fully to her. “I hope your dare goes well.” He set off at a run. Darcy followed him with her eyes. Like Henry, he turned into a comet of ghostly energy and disappeared into the night.

“Bye.”

*******

With more and more ghosts appearing over time, it became harder for Darcy to recognize where the entrance was. She wandered among the spirits for hours. Some of them came up to talk to her, others just watched her like she was some particularly interesting exhibit. Many of the ghosts weren’t even associated with American history. Darcy met Francis, the first husband of Mary, Queen of Scots. She also encountered Mary Shelley and Napoleon. It was so strange that all these people from her own history lessons happened to be here on Halloween, in this very cemetery, here in Willowdale, Virginia right when Darcy was doing her dare.

The hours passed and Darcy’s phone alerted her, at 5:30am, that it was low on battery. It was time for her to head home. The sky was already filling with a red pre-dawn light and the clouds that had gathered some hours ago were beginning to disappear. Many ghosts were already vanishing into silvery, glittery sparkles. Darcy’s legs ached, her head was swollen with all the strange sights and emotional conversations. But even as she began to follow the stone path towards the entrance, she was reluctant to leave.

When would she ever get a night like this again? To walk among the dead and talk to them? Sure Halloween was once a year but she had never seen ghosts before and she’d had her fair share of Halloween cemetery experiences. She couldn’t unhear or unsee these particular experiences nor forget that the dead were still around, in a fashion. Against the truths of tonight, the dare and the video log sat as abandoned ideas in the back of her mind.

Darcy looked out among the fewer ghosts that remained, tempted to reach out and talk to another one, to prolong this experience. The pathway took her back towards the tree where she’d met Henry. She recognised some of the names on the graves and the couple of distinctive tombstones shapes like animals and people that marked out this area. It seemed like weeks since she had had the conversation with Henry but it was merely hours ago. As she neared the tree, she saw a ghost sitting at its roots, leaning back against it.

It was a young man, not much older than Darcy, and he leaned against the tree with a kind of elegance, his long legs stretched out before him. His hands rested on his stomach and he was looking out towards the lightening sky. He was extremely handsome with delicate cheekbones. He looked over towards Darcy. His face broke into a grin that made his eyes shine. He was wearing clothes that reminded her of Thor’s, all leather with random metal pieces, like a kind of armour. He was covered from neck to toe. He had a leaner build to Thor but his hair was much longer. Darcy saw it disappear somewhere behind his shoulders as he lifted himself to his feet and moved gracefully towards her.

“Who are you?” Darcy asked. There was no one here with that unusual dress sense. It looked like sci fi met fantasy and had a love child with it.

The man hesitated, stopping a few feet away from her. “I suppose we haven’t formally met,” he conceded.

Darcy’s tired eyebrows slowly rose. “We haven’t met in any sense.”

“Oh but I’ve seen you before. Darcy Lewis, the woman who tazed the God of Thunder.” It was really hard not to give an appreciate grin at that introduction and so Darcy didn’t bother to try. She felt her cheeks warm slightly at the praise. “There’s not many people who can claim to taze the God of Thunder.”

“Thank you,” Darcy tucked one ankle behind the other and made a tiny curtsey. She scrunched up her face as she thought back to that. “How do you know about that? I’m pretty sure I would remember seeing you.”

The man’s grin widened and he made a small half bow to her in return. His whole air was more than just graceful. It was downright regal. “Well that is spectacularly flattering of you to say. No we haven’t met. I watched the events that befell your town from afar. Very far in fact.”

Horror began to creep into Darcy’s chest as she listened to his words. Realization began to knock into her mind as she connected the clues. “Loki,” she whispered, “fucking Loki.” All of the tiredness within her was overridden by a kind of scarlet rage. “All that shit in New Mexico was down to you? You’re Thor’s brother.”

Loki straightened up and the humour drained from his face as he looked Darcy in the eye. “Yes, well I was in a very bad place back then.”

“That doesn’t justify what you did,” Darcy chided, “and if I could, I’d slap you right now. Or go for the set,” she said. Her shoulder bag, she realised, was somewhere in the cemetery. She must have dropped it in the chase with Henry. She sighed and looked back in that direction. She just hoped all of her stuff hadn’t fallen out and gotten lost.

The god huffed a kind of laugh and the noise distracted her again. “Your friend Jane already did those honours. I should probably be grateful that I’m dead so you can’t taze me too.” His words were humorous but his eyes held a distant sadness, like he was trying to hold it back. His smile was weak.

“You deserved far worse. But lucky for you, Thor told me everything,” Darcy said. “And honestly, thinking about your crazy family drama gives me a headache so let’s not.” She looked back towards where she’d come from. “I need to go and get my things thanks to that stupid English ghost, Henry the Ass.”

Loki laughed again. This one sounded a bit more real. “Ah yes, I did hear about Henry chasing down a mortal earlier on. You’re becoming quite the talk of the cemetery.”

Darcy folded her arms. “Yeah well he decided to try and off me.”

“From what I heard, you quite enraged him beyond reason.”

“That didn’t take much. His temper is shorter than his marriages.”

Loki laughed again, along with Darcy as the tension broke inside of her after all the stress, curiosity and strangeness of the evening. The laughter began to pour out of her, uncontrollably and fierce. She didn’t really know why she was laughing. She’d been terrified for her life, the whole experience of being around these various ghosts was odd and now she was talking to Thor’s psychotic brother. This was off the spectrum of Halloween madness completely.

Finally she stopped and wiped at her eyes. The tiredness returned to her again, fully this time. She closed her eyes and stopped herself from swaying on the spot.

“Right. Stuff,” she murmured and began to walk back the way she’d come. The sudden chill of a ghostly presence next to her, told her that Loki was accompanying her.

“You have a knack of surviving these great events,” Loki remarked as they walked together. First New Mexico then London and even now you are still alive after half the universe has been destroyed.

Darcy held up a finger. “If you’re about to compare me to a cockroach then shut the hell up now.”

“I was about to compare you to one of our valkyries.”

“Val-ki-what?”

“Valkyries. Elite female warriors that have survived many wars and conflicts. You would possibly have made a good Asgardian.”

Darcy didn’t say anything. Did he think he could flatter her? Although then again, it wasn’t like she could do anything for him now unless he just wanted to mess with her head. Even after what Thor had told her about Loki finally moving back towards him as a brother and them dealing with some of their issues, it was difficult to trust anyone whose job title was God of Mischief. Darcy kept her gaze focused on the grass, searching for her stuff.

“Over here.” Suddenly Loki’s voice was no longer next to her but, instead, was several rows of tombstones away. Darcy moved around numerous tombstones to cut a shorter path. Her bag lay open in front of a tombstone. Her notebook was half out and a dozen pens and pencils had spilled out onto the grass. She knelt down to pick them up, glancing once at Loki who was leaning on the tombstone with a slight smile. Darcy was about to tell him he could buzz off when her gaze landed fully on the name on the tombstone.

_Elizabeth Veronica Lewis. _  
_22nd September 1969 - 28th May 2002_  
_Beloved Mother and Friend._

Darcy stared at the tombstone, forgetting her things for the moment. How many hours had she spent in this cemetery and she’d not stopped by to visit her mom? Darcy thought of all the ghosts that had been here tonight and she hadn’t seen her mother among them. Was she somewhere else? Darcy looked up, ignoring Loki for the moment and staring around. More and more ghosts were disappearing under the brightness of dawning day.

“Mom!” she called out. It was a desperate shot but worth it. There were still spirits around. Maybe there was time for her Mom to come back. “Mom!” she called again. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Loki looking at her mother’s tombstone. His smile disappeared as he looked over to her. Darcy’s cheeks reddened, burning with embarrassment. Suddenly she felt like a lost child, looking for her mother. But when she looked around again, all she saw was more ghosts disappearing. In the distance, the sun was beginning to climb.

“It’s time for us to go,” Loki called over to her. He stood over her bag. “Halloween is past. A new day recalls us back.”

Darcy bit her lip and tried hard not to get teary. She felt stupid, stupider than she had in a long time. “I should have found her,” she murmured. “I should have looked.”

“You don’t need to go looking for your mother. She’s always in your heart.” Loki’s voice was surprisingly gentle. “Believe me, I know.”

Darcy remembered that he had lost his mother. “Was she here? Your mother?” she asked.

“Yes,” Loki answered.

“Must have been nice, right?”

Loki stared at her with eyes glassy with emotion. But whatever he felt, he kept it to himself. “Of course.”

“I got to see so many ghosts today when I could have looked for Mom. It’s not enough to have her in here,” Darcy said as she pressed her hand over her heart. “I wanted to talk to her. But I wasted my time.” A few tears slid down her face. She wiped them back forcibly. How many times she had heard people say that line to her about her mom being in her heart. That was no comfort to an 11-year-old whose mother had dropped them off at school in the morning and had been dead by lunchtime because of some high as fuck driver. “I knew Mom was buried here and I didn’t go looking.”

“You had quite a bit to contend with tonight.”

“Not that much,” Darcy said as she walked over to her stuff and slung her bag over her shoulder.

“There’s always next year,” Loki said. “Now that you know the truth about Halloween, you can always try and find her.”

“She might not be here though,” Darcy said. “All these ghosts have come so far from where they were buried.”

“They have their own agendas,” Loki said. “But what agenda could possibly be more important than a mother seeing her child. Come back next year and I’m sure you’ll find her.”

Darcy said nothing once again. It seemed like a hollow victory, the idea of coming back next year. It did nothing to dispel the fear that was gathering in her chest, that she would step outside the cemetery, wake up and it had been one crazy dream. Or that she’d somehow be made to forget. She tightened her grip on her bag and sighed. Maybe it was best not to get her hopes up, to wait on even the remotest chance of seeing her Mom again.

She and Loki walked back towards the entrance of the cemetery. By now the light in the sky was growing brighter and brighter. Loki was fading out as they walked.

“Thanks for finding my bag,” Darcy said, waves of tiredness hitting me more frequently than before now. The gates of the cemetery were now less than a thousand yards away. She stopped herself and turned towards Loki who had stopped some paces back.

“Take care, Darcy Lewis,” Loki said as he disappeared.

Darcy felt sadness punch her in the gut. All around, she could see the last of the ghosts disappearing into sparkling lights, flying up towards the sun as if it was a magnet pulling them back. She watched it happen, all those lies flying off to the Great Beyond or whatever it was. She must have stood there for about five minutes before she turned back to the gates of the cemetery. She’d just reached them when she heard another voice.

“Happy Halloween, beautiful girl.”

Darcy spun around and caught a brief glimpse of her mother’s face, shining in the clouds as she disintegrated into the morning sunlight. Tears slid down Darcy’s face.

“Happy Halloween, Mom.”

For the last time, she turned away and walked through the gates of the cemetery, back into the waking land of the living.


	2. The Haunting of Stark Tower

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony gathers the Avengers and his resources together to give Morgan a night to remember.

“You’ve gone completely over the top,” Pepper told Tony with a smile.

“Of course I have,” Tony said as he adjusted his Dracula cape. “I’m allowed to go nuts for my kid on Halloween. And Christmas. And birthdays. And Thanksgiving. And other holidays.” He finished fiddling with his cape and turned to Pepper with a smile. “I love every second of it.”

“Me too,” Pepper said as she leaned in to kiss him tenderly on the lips. “That’s what makes me love you even more.”

The pair of them stood in what had formerly been the Stark Tower lounge floor. Now fancily carved pumpkins occupied most side tables, the coffee tables were draped in webbed cloths and many lights dangled from the ceiling in the shapes of skeleton heads, pumpkins and witches hats. Cobwebs had been hung over the windows and scattered throughout the room were other Halloween ornaments, ready to spring to life and spout spooky sayings at the merest touch. Jarvis had dimmed the lights so there was a spooky, orange glow about the room. On the coffee table were several bowls of potato chips, candy and cookies. In one corner of the room, a large table had been set up with punch bowls and more food.

“She’s going to like it, isn’t she?” Tony asked as his arms wrapped around his fiancee, his fingers tangling at the bottom of her Morticia wig. “I know it’s not the same as her going out with her friends.”

“Tony, she’s going to love it,” Pepper assured him. “She’s going to have a great night.”

“Good. She’s old enough to really start taking it all in now. I don’t want this chicken pox to spoil it for her.”

“It won’t.” Pepper promised. “Besides,” she added, “we can tell her the spots make her an extra powerful witch. Or she can pretend they’re warts or something.”

“You are fabulous,” Tony said, kissing Pepper. “Right then, I suppose we should go and get the-”

“Wow!” Morgan Stark almost tripped over her witch robes as she burst into the living room. She started twirling around, running around the room to get a good look at everything. Her face was dotted with scarlet spots. She’d been in the throes of chicken pox for about three days now.

“What part of stay in your room did you not get?” Tony asked as he grinned down at his 5-year-old daughter, following her across the room where she was lightly tugging at the cobwebs hanging over the windows.

“I did stay in my room,” Morgan said as she pulled at the cobwebs a bit harder, possibly testing their efficiency. “For five minutes.”

“Cheeky. You know what Daddy meant.” Tony chided affectionately. “You were supposed to wait until we came to get you.”

“Oh yeah because you did everything you were told,” Pepper teased as she moved to stand near Morgan.

Morgan began examining the skeleton on the nearby sidetablle. She poked him and the skeleton immediately wriggled making the little girl jump. “Happy Halloween!” it declared in a chattering, rattling voice. Morgan laughed in delight. She then looked up at Pepper, her eyes full of mischief.

“Daddy was not a good boy. He was a naughty boy,” Morgan informed her mother, diverting her attention away from the window briefly. Pepper laughed once more.

“Excuse me!” Tony protested as he crouched down. “I was an angel.” Both Pepper and Morgan snorted and fell into even more laughter. “That’s just rude. Anyway how would you know if I was bad or good, little missy? You weren’t even a sparkle then.”

“I’m the Queen of the Mystical, I know all!” Morgan declared.

“Oh really?” Tony asked. “Then I guess you already know about the surprises I have for you tonight.”

“Surprises?” Morgan repeated. “What surprises?” She abandoned the table with the skeleton and walked up to her dad, her little hand grabbing hold of his cape and tugging. “What surprises?” she asked again.

“No, no, nice try, you already knew about them, didn’t you? Since you know everything. I should just go and put them away-” Tony feigned a sigh and turned away from her.

“No, Daddy, no!” Morgan protested, her eyes huge and her arms waved about, making the dress rustle around her. She clasped her hands behind her back and swayed on the spot. “Well…. I don’t know EVERYTHING in the world. My head isn’t big enough.”

Tony smiled down at her. He made a show of pretending to think hard, looking over at Pepper who knelt down to scoop the little witch into her arms.

“That’s okay,” Pepper said, kissing her daughter’s cheek, “Daddy’s is.”

“Ouch,” Tony quipped. His expression softened as he walked over and put his arms around both Pepper and Morgan. “Okay, we’ll keep the surprises.” He said as he kissed her head. ”But you have to be a good girl, okay? Stay close to me and mom.”

“Can I see them now?” Morgan asked as she wrapped her arms around Pepper’s neck. Pepper snuggled into her.

“I think I should go and check if they’re all ready,” she said gently passing Morgan to Tony. “You go to Count Starkula here and I will go and check everything.”

“I’m sure it’s fine,” Tony murmured to her.

“You’re the one who wanted to make this perfect for her,. I’ll be back in a minute,” Pepper assured him in a whisper along with a kiss.

Tony turned back to Morgan. “So, are you ready to be super scared?” He carried her over to the couch and placed her down in the middle of some pumpkin cushions. A stuffed black cat sat on one of them. Morgan immediately took it and placed it in her lap, stroking it.

She poked her tongue out. “You can’t scare me, Daddy. I’m the Queen of the Mystical.”

Tony laughed and reached over to tickle her stomach. “Yeah? And where did you learn that word?” he asked as Morgan wriggled and scooted away with the cat.

“Chrissie at school. Her mommy is a mystical lady,” Morgan told him. “She reads cards and has crystals and magic.”

“Oh does she?” Tony hid his skepticism as best as he could. “That’s… that’s pretty cool isn’t it?”

“Yep,” Morgan said. “I like this cat. I’ll call him Sooty.”

“That’s a great name,” Tony said as he watched her fussing over the stuffed animal. “But,” Tony argued and leaned his face in, “I think you will be scared today. I brought out the best monsters for you to meet.”

“And ghosts?” Morgan asked.

“Honey ghosts aren’t real.”

“Are to!” Morgan said.

“I don’t think so.” Tony chuckled. “In fact, I’m very certain.”

“How certain?”

Tony could see the corners of her mouth curving into that little knowing smirk as her eyes glinted with competition. (Pepper had firmly laid the responsibility for that in his genes.) She was already beginning to giggle as the seconds passed. “I can see where this is going. You’re going to turn this into one of our bets.”

“I chall-chall-chall-” Morgan stuttered over the word.

“Challenge,” Tony told her.

“Yes. That. I challenge you.”

Tony bowed his head as he laughed. “Okay,” he said after he lifted up his gaze. “What are we betting?”

“Ten thousand dollars.”

“Have you got $10,000?”

“No but you have.”

“I’ve told you,” laughed Tony, “that’s not how betting works. You can’t bet _my_ money.”

Morgan pulled a face and looked down at Sooty. She seemed to be giving the matter some serious thought. “Late bedtime?” she asked, after about a minute of thinking.

Tony stroked his chin. “Hmmm. It can’t be too late, little miss. I tell you what,” he said as he snapped his fingers. “You win, I’ll let you stay up until 10.”

“10?!” Morgan’s face was taken over by joy. “10!” Great, Tony thought to himself, maybe that was too late. Pepper was going to be miffed. “Ten o’clock, ten o’clock!” his daughter continued to cheer. “Okay. Okay!” It was hard not to love the enthusiasm and the excitement that was shaking her little body. It’s only for one night. Just for Halloween.

“But,” Tony held up a finger and interrupted his daughter’s chanting, “if I win, you have to go to bed at eight o’clock.”

The enthusiasm vanished from Morgan’s face. “Eight?!” she repeated.

Tony nodded with a smile. “Still want to make the bet?”

“Yes!” Morgan didn’t even hesitate. “You’re going down. Ghosts come out on Halloween so, Daddy, jokes on you,” she giggled after her declaration.

Tony chuckled. The cheek on this kid.

********************************

Fifteen minutes later found the family of three walking into the elevator, which had also been suitably decorated with bats and pictures of tombstones. As the elevator doors closed, a great booming laugh sounded around the lift. Morgan jumped a little and looked around, her face alight with exhilaration.

“Maybe we shouldn’t have taken the lift, Peps,” he mock whispered to Pepper. “I think someone might have tricked it!” As he said the last bit loudly, some purple smoke began to come from under the doorway.

“Magic smoke!” Morgan declared. She lifted her wand in the air (a souvenir from the Universal Studios Wizarding World of Harry Potter ride) and pointed it at her parents and herself. “Don’t worry! I’ll save us!”

Pepper began to laugh, starting off with a giggle at first and then letting her laughter take over her. Tony did the same, slowly falling to his knees. “Can’t… stop… laughing!”

Morgan gasped. “It’s a laughing spell!” She waved her wand around and around frequently. Another round of laughter was emitted from the elevator.

“Even… the elevator… haha… is laughing…” Pepper gasped between giggles.

Morgan made some more dramatic sweeping gestures with her wand. She poked at the door and shouted, “Begone!” After about a minute, the smoke began to disappear.

“Well done,” Tony gasped after reducing his laughter bit by bit. “Well done! Morgan saved us… Oh ouch…” he rubbed his chest.

Morgan looked at her parents. “Stick with me, Mommy and Daddy.” As the elevator doors opened, she led them out into a dark hallway. Glow in the dark spiders and pumpkin faces shone out at them on the walls. Bits of cobwebs hung down from the ceiling. They all had to pull bits of them when they walked through it. With another chorus of that evil laughter, the elevator doors shut behind them.

“Oh no, we should have brought a torch,” Pepper pretended to complain.

“Don’t worry, Mommy. I’ll look after us. Hold Mommy’s hand, Daddy.”

Tony stifled a laugh with his fist and took hold of Pepper’s hand. “I don’t know if we should be doing this. It’s very scary.”

“Scarier than I thought it would be,” Pepper agreed with a gasp.

Morgan continued on until they reached a door with a glowing 1 on the front. She looked at her parents and put a finger to her lips. “There might be monsters.”

“We should keep the door shut then,” said Tony.

“We can’t do that, Daddy. We have to inve-vest-vesti-”

“Investigate,” Pepper corrected.

“Yes,” Morgan said. She knocked on the door. “Hello? Mister Monster?”

The door flung itself open. Morgan screamed and staggered back, tripping over her dress. Pepper caught her before she could fall. Tony stumbled back a few paces himself at the force of the sudden presence in the doorway - that of a great werewolf, tall and broadly built. The creature suddenly let out a large howl.

“Whoooooooo goes there?” Thor’s voice roared out many octaves higher than its usual tone, beneath the wolf costume. It cut through to even Tony’s core. He momentarily regretting giving Thor a full body wolf suit now. “Is it my… dinner?” Thor growled.

“Nooo,” Morgan raised her wand. “No, it is not your dinner!” she protested. “Get back, Mr Werewolf! Get back!”

Thor gave an almighty roar. Morgan was positively shaking now. Tony was this close to snatching his daughter away from Thor. Was the Asgardian not capable of toning it down for a little girl? He was being terrifying enough to give a teenager to heebie jeebies, let alone Morgan. Then Morgan surprised him. She charged forwards with her wand and poked Thor in the stomach with her wand.

“Hocus pocus, locus crocus!” Morgan yelled.

Thor threw up his hands and gave a convincing yell/wail. His hands clawed at the air. Morgan continued to use her wand and wave her arms about dramatically. “Nice Wolf!” she yelled and poked Thor again. He swayed around a few times and then stumbled to his knees in front of Morgan. After a moment, he pressed his claws to the side of his head.

“Oh… Oh my… that was very scary,” he said in a softer voice. “You must have been very scared.”

“Nope!” Morgan answered.

“You weren’t!?” Thor asked. “You must be the bravest little girl on Earth.”

“I’m not a little girl,” Morgan pouted. “I’m the Mystical Queen.”

“Oh I do beg your pardon,” Thor was now bent on one knee in front of Morgan. “Your royal highness,” he bowed his head. “What brings you to my cave?”

Morgan swayed from side to side, smiling. “Trick or treat!”

Thor lifted his head. “Trick or treat you say?” He rose up and stepped into his room briefly. He returned with a pumpkin basket full of candy. “I think you have earned yourself a lot of treats tonight for your bravery in saving me.” He picked up a handful of candy and held them out to Morgan. Pepper passed her her own pumpkin basket and Thor deposited the candy in them. Morgan quivered with delight.

“Thank you, Mr Werewolf!” she said before turning to Tony and Pepper. “Door number 2 next!”

Along they walked towards the next door. It was a short walk but before they could reach it, a holographic ghost appeared in front of them, pale green and ethereal. The ghost wore a top hat and suit. He carried a cane in one of his hands. Morgan squealed when she saw him.

“A ghost! Look, Daddy, a ghost!”

Tony pretended to stumble back. “What? But that can’t be? Ghosts are not real.”

“It’s right there, Daddy!” Morgan yelled. “Now I can stay up till 10!”

“10?” Pepper whispered in Tony’s ear. “Really?”

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Tony muttered.

“Where have I heard that before?”

********************************

After Morgan had thoroughly investigated the ghost by walking through it and examining its light, they moved onto the next room. Morgan knocked on door number 2 three times (causing Tony to wonder if something had gone wrong with this Avenger) before it creaked open. The room inside was quite dark. A shadowy figure inside was stuffing something into a large bag. He stepped into some moonlight, illuminating Steve in a white and black striped top and dark pants, a mask over his eyes.

“Burglar!” yelled Morgan. She pointed her wand at him. “Hocus pocus locus crocus!”

Steve side stepped and looked at Morgan. “Haha! You can’t get me!”

“Hocus pocus locus crocus!” Morgan yelled again but again, Steve sidestepped. “HOCUS POCUS LOCUS CROCUS!” she screamed at him, moving her wand as he moved. Steve suddenly cried out and fell to the floor, twitching. Morgan grinned. “Yay! I got him!”

“You did!” Pepper said patting her daughter on the back. “Clever girl.”

“We need to call the police,” Morgan said.

“Oh no, not tonight,” Tony said, quickly kneeling down next to Morgan. “Because the thing about Halloween is… the witches are the police.”

“I’m the police?” Morgan asked. She pointed her wand at Steve. “Go to jail!”

“You could poof him to jail,” Tony agreed, “or you could give him a fine. Now what’s the magic phrase?”

Morgan thought for a moment. “Trick or treat!” Morgan held out her bucket expectantly. “Don’t do it again!”

Steve got to his feet. “Darn you you crafty witch.” He handed over a handful of candy into Morgan’s bucket. Tony eyed some of the labels and raised an eyebrow at Steve.

“Sugar free, really?”

Pepper snickered.

“One of us monsters should be concerned with her teeth,” Steve quipped.

“Fair point,” Pepper whispered.

********************************

The next part of the hallway was entirely dark and Morgan hesitated before stepping into it. She looked up at Pepper and whimpered. Pepper lifted her up and the little girl clung to her mother’s dark wig. The three of them walked forward and the sounds of bats fluttering rushed over them. Morgan squeaked and Pepper began to rub her back soothingly.

“It’s okay…” she soothed, giving Tony a look.

“Would you like some help with ze dark?”

Out of the darkness, came several golden glows and Wanda stepped forward, dressed in a golden candelabra costume. Her usual scarlet magic flared gold from her fingertips. She swung her arms around. Morgan’s face lit up under the movement of the light.

“Lumiere!” she beamed.

Wanda bowed. “Yes, it is I. How may I be of assistance?”

“It’s too dark,” Morgan whimpered.

Wanda turned to face the darkness behind her. “Well then we must banish ze dark. Follow me!” With more grand gestures, she began to move back through the darkness. Slowly some of the wall torches began to light as Wanda cast her magic past them, illuminating the hallway.

“Yes!” Morgan cheered as they reached the next door. She pulled at the door handle once Pepper put her down. Unfortunately, it was locked. She tapped at it with her wand. She looked back towards Wanda. “They’re not home,” she said with a heavy, sad sigh. “No treats from this room.”

“Hooow about tricksssss?” hissed a voice from behind them all. The group turned around to see a mummy slowly dragging its feet across the hall to them, arms out stretched. It was wrapped up in many layers of dirty bandages and its eyes glinted silver in the darkness of the hallway “Triiiiickss…” it continued to hiss. “Triiiickssss….”

“You can’t trick me, Mummy!” Morgan declared, pointing her wand at the mummy. She waved her wand at him. “Hocus pocus locus crocus!” The mummy continued forward, both arms getting closer to Morgan as it advanced. Morgan backed off into the wall behind her. “Oh no!” she wailed.

“Mummies must be immune to magic,” Pepper gasped.

“I’ll fight it!” Tony stepped forward, flourishing his cape. “Count Starkula to the rescue!” He rushed at the mummy whose arms grabbed at Tony who grabbed the mummy back. The two of them began to grapple with each other. The mummy pushed Tony back against the wall then Tony pushed the mummy to the floor. The mummy rolled and tripped Tony up so he fell down on the floor in front of Morgan.

“Daddy no!” Morgan shrieked, wide eyed, watching as the mummy grabbed Tony’s feet and began to drag him off. “Lumiere! We have to save my daddy!”

“Of course we will!” Wanda leaped forward as the mummy came her way. She took a step forward, landing on a piece of bandages that was trailing behind the mummy.

“Oh!” The mummy declared. Suddenly it began to spin, getting faster and faster in a blur until it looked like a small tornado. Seconds later it stopped and it was Pietro stood among the pile of bandages. Morgan began to clap her hands in delight.

“Uncle Pietro! Lumiere you saved him!”

Pietro took a bow and looked between Wanda and the Starks. “Thanks very much. It was stuffy under there!”

Tony got to his feet and adjusted his cloak. “You got my cloak all dirty!” he protested. Morgan giggled at him.

“Next room, next room!” she declared and bounced off in the vicinity of room number 4.

********************************

As they turned onto another corridor to get to the fourth room, a great crowd of ghosts appeared in front of them. They were dressed in suits and ballgowns like they’d perished on their way to the opera or some great charity ball. A couple of young looking ones, dressed as chimney sweeps, rushed around the new arrivals. Morgan laughed as they moved around her. She reached out to feel their ghostly energy and watched them disappear and reform.

“I told you!” she declared as Tony walked with her, around the ghosts. “I told you!”

“Yes, yes you did, clever clogs,” Tony said as he ruffled her hair.

“How dare you?!” Morgan shouted. “My hair has been tidied by ghosts.”

“Oh really?” Tony snuck a quick look at Pepper whose eyes were glistening with tears of laughter. “You’ll have to give me the name of your stylist then.”

“She’s not gonna be happy with you, Daddy. You messed it up.”

“Oh dear. Can you magic it fixed?” he asked as they stopped outside of the door.

“No. I have to use magic to fight monsters now, Daddy.” Morgan said as she turned to knock on the door.

Just then a horrendous smell radiated from underneath the door as a green smoke appeared under it, floating up to surround the group. Tony choked on the awful smell. He might have picked it out himself but nothing quite prepared you for the stench of rotten eggs, manure and farts hitting you all at once.

“EWWWW!” Morgan shrieked.

“That is foul!” Wanda spluttered as she covered her mouth.

“How stinky is that?” Pepper spoke from behind both of her hands.

“Very stinky!” Morgan said.

The door opened slowly. A large all-body skunk costume, emerged from the room. “Sorry about that folks, you might want to clear the area a bit.” Clint’s voice spoke.

Morgan pointed her wand at him. “Was that you, Mr Skunk?”

“I’m afraid it was. What are you going to do about it?” The skunk put his hands on his hips.

Morgan pouted and then looked towards Pepper. “Shoulda brought the Air Wick Mommy.” Wanda, Pietro and Tony laughed as Pepper nodded, her eyes even glassier with humour. Morgan turned back to the skunk who had puffed himself up.

“How dare you? This a prime smell for a skunk.”

“It’s so stinky!” Morgan protested. “You need a bath!”

“I do not need a bath!” The skunk argued. “I had one last year thank you very much.”

“_Last year?!_” Morgan shrieked. “My Mommy makes me take a bath every day!”

“_Every_ day?!”

“Yes!”

“Then why do you stink?”

“I don’t stink!” Morgan protested.

“You do! All flowery and bubbles. Yuck!”

“You smell like animal poo!” Morgan fired back.

“Why you little-!” Suddenly the skunk reached down and scooped Morgan up. Her basket of candy dropped as he turned her upside down. She shrieked and giggled as he shook her about gently. “What a rude little girl! I should flush you down the toilet!” the skunk declared.

“Don’t do that!” Morgan wriggled.

“Put her down, skunk!” Pepper stepped forward, holding a can of Air Wick. Morgan cheered. “Unless you want to smell like a meadow.”

The skunk recoiled. “A meadow?! How horrible!” He put Morgan down and pushed her back towards Pietro. “I’ll have none of that!”

Morgan picked up her fallen wand and candy and pointed her wand at the skunk. “Trick or treat! You have to choose.”

“Trick or treat, hm?” The skunk pretended to think about it. “I think I’ll go with…”

“TRICK!” A grey, blurry shape rushed past Morgan and took her basket of candy. She stopped a little ways away. Natasha’s painted face stared over at Morgan from her costume of a particularly bushy tailed grey squirrel. “I say trick!” she declared.

“No!” Morgan declared.

“Trick it is!” The skunk replied. He dashed forward and pinched Morgan’s wand. “Run!” He yelled to his accomplice. The squirrel ran off with the candy in one direction while the skunk ran off the way they’d come with the wand.

“Oh no!” Morgan shouted. “Uncle Pietro, my wand!”

“Leave it to me!” Pietro declared dramatically. He raced round the corner after the skunk. They soon heard crashes and bangs and lots of “Ow!” from the skunk. A couple of minutes later, Pietro returned, holding out the wand. “Here you go, oh Mystical Queen.”

“Thanks!” Morgan leaped forward and snatched the wand back. She cradled it close before looking around at everyone. “We need to get the candy!”

“We do!” Tony declared. “Let’s call this, Operation Retrieve the Candy!”

“Yes!” Morgan said. “Daddy, you lead the way!”

Tony marched forward, glad to be able to laugh quietly without Morgan seeing him. So far tonight was going so well. Morgan seemed to be having the time of her life. With this much excitement going through her, who knew if she’d even make it to 10 o’clock once her energy levels crashed? It had taken a week to organize this for her and so far the chicken pox didn’t seem to be spoiling anything for her.

********************************

They all hurried down two dark corridors. Spiders dropped from the ceiling at different intervals, bringing their party to a halt as they were startled. The second time it happened, Pietro let out an even bigger shriek than Morgan. Ghosts appeared and disappeared around them, some of them walking into walls. When they turned onto the third corridor, the entire group found themselves with a face full of web. Tony, having forgotten that this wall of cobweb was there, was quietly mortified. It took everyone a couple of minutes to untangle themselves from the prop.

At the end of the corridor, Morgan spotted something. “Her tail! She’s there!” She took off down the corridor. Pepper lifted up her dress to quickly hurry after her daughter.

Everyone caught up to her outside a pair of double doors. She was stood in front of them, looking anxiously between them and her parents. As soon as she realised that everyone had joined her, that expression disappeared and she pulled open one of the double doors.

These led into a another corridor with two others branching off from the side. In the middle of the center space, was an ivory outdoor set of a table and two chairs. The table was dressed in a green blanket and there was a cauldron full of candy in the middle. Occupying the seats were the squirrel and a fancily dressed fox.

Morgan leaped up and down on the spot. “Fantastic Mr Fox!” she beamed.

“That’s right.” Bruce’s voice sounded from within the full body costume, only he had a much more upbeat tone. “I’m Mr Fox. How do you do?”

“You’re _Fantastic_ Mr Fox,” Morgan corrected him.

“Okay then. I’m Fantastic Mr Fox,” Bruce agreed. He looked over at the group. “You’ve brought some friends.”

“Yes,” Morgan said and then pointed at the squirrel. “But that squirrel stole my candy.”

Bruce gasped. “She did?” He looked over at Natasha who raised both of her hands up to her shoulders as if she knew nothing. Bruce then looked down at the candy in the cauldron and did a double take. “Wait! Did you take these from her?” he pointed to Morgan. “You actually took candy from a kid. Wow, Squirrel, just wow.”

“She asked for a trick!” Natasha answered in a squeakier voice. “I gave her a trick!” She looked at Morgan’s wand, which was out again, and gasped. “How did you get that back?”

“Uncle Pietro,” Morgan bragged.

Natasha shook her large squirrel head at Pietro. “I think that’s cheating.”

“It isn’t!” he argued.

“You and your tricks,” Bruce said, exaggeratedly shaking his head. “Give the candy back.”

“No! I tricked her out of it, fair and square!” Natasha countered.

“That’s not fair!” Morgan squealed.

“No it’s not,” Bruce agreed. “But I have an idea, oh Mystical One.” He knelt down (which was fairly hard in his costume) and beckoned Morgan over. “I think we’ll have to challenge her into giving them back. What do you think?”

“Can’t I just hocus pocus her?” Morgan asked.

“She’s wearing a special spell today - the bounce back spell. Do you want to be hocus pocus-ed?”

“Nooooo,” Morgan said.

“So we’ll have to do this another way way.” Bruce said before looking up at Natasha. “What kind of challenge can this witch do, to win back her candy?”

“Hmm I don’t know…” the squirrel stroked her chin thoughtfully. “I have some pretty hard challenges. I don’t think she can do them.”

“I can!” Morgan wailed.

The squirrel looked at her. “Okay then. Go into the hall up there, and find Waldo. If you can find him, you can have these treats. But you won’t find him.”

Morgan squared her shoulders and walked right up to the squirrel. “Yes I will.” She looked at Mr Fox. “Don’t let her eat my candy.”

“I won’t. I’ll guard it.” Bruce promised her.

“Okay!” Morgan skipped around the table and up towards the hall. Tony and the others following her.

“Christ it’s hot in here,” Tony heard Bruce mutter.

“Jeez, you think?” Natasha returned the sentiment.

********************************

Morgan found herself facing a hall full of ghosts. Each and every one of them was coloured in like Waldo. “Oh no!” she declared, putting her hands to her head. “Oh no.”

“Oh no!” Wanda whispered. “How are we going to tell which one is real?”

“How about we touch them?” Pietro suggested. He moved forward to touch one and one of the ghosts disappeared. All of them rearranged and Morgan wailed.

“Don’t do that!”

Pepper knelt next to her daughter. “I think we’re going to have to be clever about this, Morgan,” she said. “How do we look for things?” she asked.

“With our eyes!”

“So how should we find Waldo?”

“Looking for him.”

“We’ll have to do so very carefully,” Tony agreed, “because they’re all moving around.”

“And we can’t touch them,” Morgan agreed.

“No we can’t. Okay, let’s go and look,” Pepper said, taking Morgan’s hand. Tony took the other. “Let’s go,” Pepper said and the three of them started moving forward.

Wanda and Pietro stepped back to watch the little family moving through the sea of ghosts. Wanda laughed gently. “She’s having a wonderful time, isn’t she?”

“She’s gonna sleep tonight.” Pietro agreed. “This is much better than going out trick or treating anyway.”

“Of course but she’ll miss her friends, won’t she?” Wanda pointed out.

“She can do it with her friends next year. She’ll only have this chicken rash once.”

“Pox,” Wanda chuckled. “They call it chicken pox.”

“You’re a chicken pox.”

“And you’re a child,” Wanda gave him an affectionate roll of her eyes and her elbow. Her gaze relaxed as she watched Morgan. “She’s a lovely little girl.”

“She’s not so bad,” Pietro said.

“Come off it, Pietro, you love her and she adores you.” Wanda teased. “You like being her uncle.” Pietro snorted at her but he was grinning as he watched Morgan.

“Over here!” In the back of the crowd, Wally appeared waving. “Come and find me!” Peter Parker called before disappearing back into the crowd of ghosts.

“Over there, quick!” Pepper urged as Morgan charged forwards.

When Morgan drew closer to him, Peter moved to the other side of the crowd. Sometimes he moved right behind her and then away again. For the next ten minutes, it was a game of cat, ghosts and mouse. Finally Peter allowed Morgan to catch him in the middle of the crowd. She grabbed his arm from behind and he gasped, falling back onto his ass.

“Oh no, you caught me!” he declared. “You are too good. That wasn’t fair.”

Morgan waved her wand at him. “Hocus pocus locus crocus.”

“Hey!” Peter objected. “What was that for?”

“You can’t run away now!” Morgan told him. She took his hand and waited for him to get up.

Once he had, she began to lead him back to where Fantastic Mr Fox and Squirrel were picking through some of her candy.

“HEY!” Morgan roared.

********************************

Half an hour later, with the adventure over, everyone had taken their place in the lounge area, surrounded by drinks and snacks. Jarvis loaded the movie, The Nightmare Before Christmas and dimmed the lights. Morgan was curled up on the smaller sofa in her mother’s lap while Pepper was curled up against Tony, her legs under her. Bruce, Pietro and Steve had taken the other sofa. Natasha, Wanda, Thor and Clint all took places between the sofas and the coffee table.

They were some way into the film and Morgan was already yawning between munches of her popcorn.

“Have you had a good night, sweetie?” Tony whispered.

“Best Halloween ever,” Morgan whispered.

Pepper smiled at them both before she learned up to kiss Tony. “You did good, really good. She’s not gonna forget this Halloween in a hurry.”

Tony smiled as he stroked Morgan’s hair. “It was a team effort.”

“Yeah but you put it together, and you put a smile back on our daughter’s face,” Pepper whispered.

“That’s what I want, to make you and Morgan happy.”

“You do, Tony,” Pepper whispered. Suddenly a cluster of popcorn landed in their laps and in Morgan’s face. Both Tony and Pepper whirled around and Morgan giggled.

“Would you mind, Stark?” Thor protested. He gestured to the TV where Jack was spying on Christmas Town. “Some of us are trying to enjoy the movie.”

Tony picked up a handful of popcorn and threw it back at Thor. “Then don’t listen in.” His popcorn hit Natasha in the face. She picked up some jelly babies and threw them back.

“Oh it’s on,” Tony said.

For the next ten minutes, no one saw what happened in the movie. Candy, cookies and popcorn went flying as all out war burst out. Thor, Steve and Clint were some of the better throwers though Natasha, Wanda and Pepper were adept at sneaking into people’s faces to land their blows. Pietro dashed around filling up supplies as well as landing his own hits. Morgan joined in the food fight at first but then she and Bruce retreated to beneath the dining table to watch the rest of the fight.

Eventually the movie was resumed and everyone took their places again. Some had food in their hair, others had the stickier candy stuck to their costumes and the energy of the room drained out as they settled back into the film.

Tony stroked Pepper’s hair and kissed her forehead.

“Just think,” she whispered as she looked down at Morgan. “Next year there’ll be two of them.”


	3. Hunters vs Hunted Part I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Avengers, the Guardians and their allies travel to Asgard on Halloween to play a massive team game in an epic arena. But will squabbles, mistrust and travel issues get in the way of it?

**Halloween 2019**

The challenge was made. The arena was set. The Avengers, the Guardians, and many of their allies set off for Asgard. The Guardians had refused to dress up for Halloween but everyone else had made the effort even if some had taken more persuasion than others.

They travelled in a spaceship that Tony was confident could outdo even the best space shuttle. Having set off about four hours ago, take off had gone reasonably well and the ship had been well on course for a speedy journey. That is, until they left the Earth’s atmosphere. The ship had slowed down exponentially, making some very concerning spluttering noises before Tony and Rhodey tinkered somewhat to make the noises stop. However, the speed remained the same as they began to leave the Earth behind and began to crawl along towards Asgard.

“Maybe we’ll make it in time for Halloween 2020,” mused Bruce who was dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow. He sat with the hat on his lap, looking out of the window into the great cosmos of space, his scientific mind drinking in the stars and constellations.

“It just needs some adjustments,” Tony huffed from the front of the spacecraft, as he crouched down below the console panel, rust and dirt already falling onto his Joker suit. “It’ll be fine.”

“That’s what you said four hours ago,” Steve said from the back of the ship. He was dressed as Dennis the Menace.

“It’d have been faster to let Thor take us by Bifrost.” Jane sighed. She fidgeted with the buttons on her cowgirl shirt from her Jessie from Toy Story costume.

“Yes, maybe,” Tony agreed, “but this way, we get the satisfaction of knowing that we made our own way here.”

“I think we’d all rather prefer that we were there, Tony.” Nick Fury growled from one of the back seats where he blended in with the shadows with his V from V for Vendetta costume . “There’s four hours we won’t see again.”

“Or I could get out and push,” Carol offered. She was dressed as Red Riding Hood with a ruby cape, a similarly coloured bodice and thick black net skirt

“No!” Tony protested. “I’ll get it sorted. Just give it a bit more time.”

“That’s the problem, Stark. Halloween only lasts for 24 hours,” Stephen reminded him. He stood out, in the back of the spaceship with his Beetlejuice suit. “And some of us would like to actually spend some of it in Asgard. Perhaps I could be of assistance.”

Tony scowled in response. “When did you become a technician? Was it before or after medical training?”

“Guys…” Steve warned.

“Look guys, I’d rather take the bifrost,” Bruce said.

“Me too,” Stephen agreed.

“Me three,” Nick added.

“Can we just-” Peter Parker, dressed as a Black Widow spider began to say.

“Really guys? Really?” Tony asked everyone. He turned back to Bruce. “Do you think the other guy could handle that kind of pressurized travel?”

Bruce pulled a face. “Maybe.”

“Maybe. So you’re willing to possibly Hulk out and give the Asgardians one hell of a surprise and probably trash their bifrost thing.” Tony said.

Banner was silent for a good while after that. Darcy, meanwhile, who was dressed as P.T Barnum, rolled her eyes to the heavens and looked up towards the ship’s speakers.

“We’ve been listening to Monster Mash for 4 hours now. Please, I’m begging you, play something else… or turn it off,” she whined.

“Yes please do!” T’Challa agreed next to Darcy. “My poor ears…” He was dressed as Owl from Winnie the Pooh. He’d had significant difficulty buckling himself into the security straps with the wings attached to the back of his arms.

Tony grumbled. “The stereo is stuck. It’s this or no music at all.”

“No music at all!” Nearly everyone chorused.

************************

Another hour passed them by with very little progress being made. Pietro and Wanda started getting more and more people playing cards with them. The Sokovian twins were dressed as Disney characters. Pietro was Zazu from the Lion King and Wanda was Snow White. Clint had joined them early on in the game, dressed as Legolas (a choice which had earned him many a joke from Tony saying that he’d called it first, back in 2012).

Darcy was trying to have a nap, her head leaning against the window next to her seat. Her eyes flickered open and she found herself staring out of the window. Suddenly, there came a light in the distance. It was fast and brightly coloured, like a rainbow. She immediately sat up to take notice. “Hey guys-”

There was no time to warn them. The light shot inside the ship within the second, surrounding everyone with individual glows and then, with a pulling sensation Darcy felt in the pit of her stomach, yanked them out of the ship and into a tunnel of rapid, rainbow light.

“Woooo!!!!” she cheered as she shot along. “This is more like it!”

“My ship!” Tony cried out.

“Yeeeessss!” Bruce cheered.

They shot along the multi-coloured corridor in speeding seconds. The intensity of the travel pulled excited whoops and other cries from within them all. The walls of the rainbow light sparkled and glittered. But there was no time to admire for long. They continued to build up speed until the end of the light appeared in a growing circular shadow.

Finally they were thrown into a darkened, bronze room. There was a mass of people skidding to a stop, colliding with each other and then falling over. Bruce, who had not Hulked out after all, quickly side stepped away from the group, tripped over his own feet and fell down in his own space.

“Graceful as ever,” a cool, mocking voice spoke up.

On Heimdall’s podium, Loki looked down at them all with an amused smile. Bruce, whose cheeks were red as he picked himself up, scowled at Loki. Next to Loki, Thor was standing with his arms folded, laughing at them all.

“Oh these are very nice costumes!”

“Oi, Point Break, what gives?” Tony challenged as he got to his feet, still a little wobbly. “I told you we were coming by spaceship.”

“Yes well, we have been waiting long enough. Your puny vessel would have taken a week to reach us.” Thor pointed out.

“Actually-” Tony began to argue but Pepper (dressed as Aziraphale from Good Omens) put a hand on his arm to stop him.

“You’re here now,” Thor continued, “and everything has been set up.” He then put a hand on his brother’s shoulder, “And of course, my brother has played his part as well. You are in for a treat.”

Many sets of eyebrows shot up in the air. It had been quite some time since Loki had been allied with the Avengers, since they had all taken down Thanos together. But the heroes of Earth knew better than to completely trust Thor’s younger brother. Tony, in particular, was eyeing Loki with contempt. Clint looked as though he would quite like to give Loki a third eye socket. Natasha’s expression was deadpan as her eyes scanned over Loki, looking for weapons. Steve had gone a bit rigid where he stood and he kept glancing at Thor as if silently asking if he was feeling quite well enough to trust his brother’s involvement in this Halloween challenge.

“How do we know we’re all going to come out of this alive?” Tony challenged.

Loki rolled his eyes. “If I wanted to kill you, Stark, I’d have done it already. You mortals are very fragile.”

Once again, Pepper had to restrain Tony, this time by grabbing his arms and whispering to him. He stepped back, putting a little more distance between himself and Loki. He turned to the other Avengers who were looking around the bifrost observatory. “Yeah, I’m still not feeling too safe about this. He could have done anything to that arena.”

“I’ve done _plenty_ to that arena,” Loki smirked.

“_None_ of which involves anybody dying!” Thor insisted.

“How can you be sure?” Natasha countered. “He’s King of Lies.” She looked fairly formidable in her voodoo witch costume which consisted of a black top hat with a scarlet ribbon, a black jacket over a crimson bodice, along with black trousers and a belt and necklace that both had bones dangling from them.

“I think you’ll find that the title for that particular crown goes to my father,” Loki informed her.

Wanda stared at him, her gaze piercing and curious. Loki looked into her eyes still smirking. He held eye contact for several moments then looked away. “He’s hiding his mind.” Wanda said. “I could not see anything.”

“Why would I let you in and let you spoil the surprises?” Loki retorted.

Thor raised his hand. “My mother and I can vouch for Loki, just as we did when we fought the Titan together. Now,” he said, clapping his hands, “can we begin to make our way? Time is of the essence as you mortals say.” Loki said nothing. Natasha and Wanda continued to look at Loki with mistrust but neither women said anything.

“So where is this arena?” Steve asked, stepping forward.

“On the other side of the city,” Thor explained. “We’ll cross the Rainbow Bridge and take a ship to the other side of the city. There everything’s been set up.”

“Does Asgard normally go this big for Halloween parties?” Bruce asked. “Cause this sounds like you went to a lot of trouble.”

“Asgard doesn’t celebrate Halloween,” Loki informed him, still smirking.

Tony blinked. “Thanks for telling us that earlier. You know, when we all got changed into our costumes _before_ we set off,” he grumbled.

“So much for first impressions being tasteful,” Stephen Strange remarked from the back of the group.

“Relax,” Thor was laughing, “our people will be interested in this cultural that you all enjoy.”

“When they’re not having a great old laugh at us,” Clint muttered, tossing some blond hair over his shoulder.

************************

They soon left the observatory behind and began their walk across the rainbow bridge, towards the golden city of Asgard. Many complaints about being laughed at in their costumes quickly died in the face of the spectacular beauty of the Realm Eternal. No one seemed to mind the long walk as it gave them all the opportunity to admire the colours in the bridge, the shining architecture of the city in front of them and the gigantic waterfall just beyond the bifrost. The chatter became much more speculative and admiring.

When they reached the bridge’s end, they saw four silver-grey boats with wings on the sides, sitting in the dock, waiting for them. Thor and Loki divided everyone into groups of five or six before getting in themselves. After that, the boats lifted off the ground and flew into the air, over the city itself.

Civilians began staring up at the collections of strangely dressed people, some of them waving up at them or catcalling. (“Told you.” Clint muttered.)

It was a short ride, thanks to the speed of the boats, towards the arena that had been set up for them.

Beyond the city, there was a great plain. Occupying most of the space within that plain was a huge maze at least a mile or two in width. Beyond the maze on three sides were a mansion, a small golden pyramid and a copse with a river running in front of it. In front of the fourth side was a tent. Thor’s friends were stood in front of it. They began to walk forward to greet them as the boats began to land.

“Holy shit, someone went overboard,” Stephen remarked as they stepped off the boats.

“This is epic!” Peter Parker declared as he untangled himself, with difficulty from the boat. “Look at it!”

Loki walked past Stephen with a cold smile. “I’m sure you’d have criticized if we didn’t make an effort. Besides, now you can see what _true_ sorcery can do.”

“I _am_ a true sorcerer,” Stephen bit back, just as coldly.

“You’re a wizard with some quaint gifts. You’ve been practicing some strange arts for about five minutes,” said Loki, “_I’m_ a true sorcerer.”

“And what good did you ever do apart from attempted genocide and trying to steal your brother’s throne? Twice.”

Loki’s gaze was scathing. “I’m sorry but I can’t take you seriously when you’re dressed like that. Truly, what are you supposed to be?”

“That’s enough!” Steve stepped between the two of them before Stephen could answer. “No one wants to stand around listening to you two when we have a game to play.” He looked at Loki and his expression was cool. “So are you actually going to tell us how to play or carry on with this bitch fight?”

“Language!” said Tony.

Steve rolled his eyes.

Loki paused for many long seconds before he gave Steve the slightest half bow. “Of course. Follow me.” He led the group over towards Thor’s friends who each stood next to a box of gadgets and trinkets. “Let us begin then.”

************************

Volstagg handed everyone a leather black bracelet with an emerald threaded into it. As soon as the bracelet fastened around everyone’s wrists, they noticed a glow appear within the emerald itself. The strap was comfortable and secure. A few of them moved their wrists around, testing whether the thing might be shaken off. Bruce was eyeing his wrist strap with a great deal of worry in his eyes. Volstagg patted him on the arm which did absolutely nothing to reassure Bruce whatsoever.

“Before the prince explains the game,” Volstagg declared, “you need to take care of these straps. The emerald monitors your vital signs and it will send a signal to us if any of you fall into life threatening trouble such as falling ill or accidentally hurting yourself or each other. One of us will come and assist you if anything like that happens.”

“How will you know which one of us is in trouble?” Peter Quill asked. “They all look the same.”

“You’ve all been assigned a number,” said Volstagg. “That number will flash on our bands.” He held up his own wrist where a version of the band was strapped on. “So we’ll know exactly who to help.”

“Kay,” Peter answered, examining his strap once more.

Volstagg looked around them all. “Any more questions about the straps?”

“What if someone else takes it off?” Steve asked.

“Not possible,” Loki interrupted. “Only you can remove the strap. As soon as it was fastened to your skin, you became the key to it.”

“Kinda feels like something we should have been told before,” Tony mused, “like we’re being strapped into explosives or something.”

Loki ignored him. Volstagg looked around again but no one else spoke up. He turned back to Loki. “Go ahead.”

Loki clapped his hands together and began to walk around the space in front of them all. “The game is called Hunter vs Hunted. The premise is not hard to guess at. Half of you will be hunters, half of you will be the hunted. The object of the game, if you’re a hunter, is to get as many of the hunted as you can. If you’re the hunted, your goal is to evade capture throughout the two hours allotted to the game. You will also be provided with a Stark watch and get a five minute head start into the maze.”

“Wow, five whole minutes,” Stephen muttered. Carol grinned.

“This is going to be great,” Pietro said. “I-” his words were cut off when Sif placed a white and blue bracelet on his arm and a similar one on Wanda and another on Stephen. “What is this?”

“A limiter,” said Sif.

“For obvious reasons, your powers will need to be suppressed temporarily, to make this a fair game,” Loki told the irritated looking Pietro. Wanda just nodded her head and Stephen shrugged. “Once the game is over, the limiter will be removed and only myself, Thor, Sif, Volstagg, Fandral or Hogun can remove them. So don’t even try,” he looked over at Pietro who had attempted to remove it.

“There will be two designated safe spaces for the hunted to hide. The pyramid and the woodland beyond the river are those safe spaces. You can only stay in there for five minutes though and once you leave, you will have to remain in the danger zone for at least fifteen minutes before you can go in again. The Stark watches will time how long you are in there and how long it will be before you can re-enter. Anyone who stays in the safe zone beyond their allotted time will be eligible to be taken by a hunter.”

“Yeah but the hunters aren’t going to know that are they?” Gamora asked.

“Ah but they will. Those wrist straps will emit blue laser lights all over the hunted that has outstayed their safety,” Loki said, “thus any nearby hunters will know they are fair game.”

“How do the hunters capture the hunted?” Clint asked. “Do we just drag them back?”

Loki snorted. “Nothing quite that barbaric,” he said, earning himself a glare from the archer. “As soon as you touch your emerald to theirs, they will become magnetised to you. They will have to follow you to the mansion.”

“Jeez, sucks to be the hunted,” Quill muttered.

“Not completely,” Loki said. “Once a hunter takes a hunted, they must take them to the mansion. The hunted then gets one chance to earn another chance in the game. If they can make their way through the tricks and traps I’ve set up in the mansion then they will be free to re-enter the maze. Thus it adds to the challenge for the hunters. ”

Many of the gathered heroes seemed to perk up at that. Carol, in particular, folded her arms and grinned around at them. “Sounds pretty fun to me.”

“Yeah that mansion won’t know what’s hit it,” agreed Bucky, patting Steve’s shoulder. He was dressed in a Jack the Ripper outfit and Steve had subjected him to many a joke about how he was ‘bettering’ himself with the stylish suit and cloak.

Loki folded his arms. “While I admire your confidence, I have not made the surprises easy to overcome.”

“I doubt you’ve made them possible to overcome,” Clint muttered.

“They’re perfectly possible to accomplish if you use your skills properly and put your mind to the task,” said Loki. “I understand, of course, Agent Barton, that that might be difficult for you,” he added. It was one crack too many and Clint was fast. The punch caught Loki off guard and he stumbled backwards.

Fandral caught him with a laugh, lightly pushing him to one side. “Now, now gentlemen.”

“That’s enough,” Thor declared, stepping forward. “It’s time to choose the teams. Loki will be the overseer for the hunters. I will be overseer for the hunted.”

“And they have a bet on the outcome,” Hogun announced with a small smile.

“Yes we do. So please, those of you who become hunters, do your best.” Thor said encouragingly.

************************

The names were chosen by way of a magical coin. The coin flashed green if the person was a hunter and red if they were the hunted. It took about half an hour to get everyone sorted and strapped up appropriately. Once they had, the two groups were gathered in their separate factions. Thor stood with the hunters at the entrance to the maze and Loki stood with his hunters, further away.

The hunters consisted of; Steve, Pietro, Wanda, Clint, Sam, Jane, Stephen, Nick, T’Challa, Drax, Rocket, Mantis and Pepper.

Bruce, Tony, Natasha, Darcy, Bucky, Erik, Peter Parker, Carol, Rhodey, Gamora, Groot, Peter Quill and Happy made up the hunted team.

As everyone stood ready to go, Thor looked towards his group and raised his hammer in the air.

“Good luck. You have five minutes.”

As he lowered his hammer, his team plunged into the maze.


	4. Hunter vs Hunted Part II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The game is underway and the mansion holds many tricks and scenarios.

Thirteen people rushing to get through the entrance to the maze all at once was just asking for trouble - the first six of them especially so - as Quill, Groot, Gamora, Happy, Tony and Bucky squashed together, their joint body mass snapping hedge branches, their feet making stomping, scuffling noises. The addition of the rest of the group forced everyone forward bit by bit but then the grumbling started and the cries of discomfort and pain and the many, many swear words.

“Get out of the fucking way!” Gamora shouted as she pushed her way out of the mass.

“You move it!” Bucky spat back.“

“Get your elbow out of my face, tree boy!” Tony complained.

“I am Groot!” Groot growled back.

“I don’t care if your name is Darth Vader, move it!”

“Easy, no need to barge!” Happy declared.

As Gamora pushed herself out of the group, Quill found himself face first in the hedge and Groot just about managed to side step in time before the green skinned warrior stepped on his feet. Bruce, who had hung back to avoid a series of collisions that might bring the other guy out, sighed and shook his head, letting himself fall further behind. Natasha was moving quickly past people too, sliding through the intimate spaces between her comrades and the hedges to gradually overtake people.

Up ahead, Quill picked up his own pace to try and catch up with Gamora. Happy, who had been knocked back somewhat, adjusted his Hagrid costume and attempted to follow Tony who was running far ahead as more people began to realise that they couldn’t all move at the same pace if they didn’t want to squander their five minutes of freedom. Some hung back as others raced on. Soon there was more space and everyone ploughed ahead.

The different pathways started after the pathway’s first curve. Tony disappeared down one. Happy, who had lost sight of Tony pretty quickly despite his efforts, went down another. Peter Parker scrambled his way down another, grabbing at some of the spider legs sticking out from his back in an attempt to stop them catching on the hedges. The group dispersed down the different pathways pretty quickly as the seconds passed.

“Spread out!” Tony said as he turned around to find Natasha, Erik and Rhodey behind him. They came upon a choice of three paths. He darted down one with Rhodey while Erik and Natasha took the other paths. Tony touched his Stark watch, in which he’d already installed a communication system for his team. “Don’t go to the safe places. They’ll just catch up to us and wait for us to leave. Spread ourselves thin.”

“Got it!” he heard Peter Parker’s answer.

In the next second, another voice filled the comm system.

“You thought I wouldn’t noticed this, Stark? Brave but once my hunters are unleashed, this little communications trick will be disabled.”

_Bastard_, Tony thought. “Good luck guys!” he called down the Stark watch. “Let’s do this.”

****

Meanwhile Bruce continued to surge forward throughout the maze, taking whatever different path he could see. As he ran, his hands lifted in the air reminiscent of Captain Jack’s run. He turned left then right, then right again and then came to a four pathway crossroad. He rushed forward. He could see the mansion in the distance, meaning he was pretty far from the entrance. Problem was, if he got caught then the hunter didn’t have a long way to take him. Although on the other side of that, he didn’t have a long way before he got a chance to get back in the game. His blood was already pumping, the adrenaline racing around inside him. He stopped, taking a few deep breaths. _Don’t get too excited._

He turned right, in the direction of the copse and the river. That looked like a peaceful, relaxing safe place. The pyramid, on the other hand, was tall, golden and imposing. Bruce felt trapped just thinking about going inside. Probably best for the other guy if he didn’t go in there.

“One minute to go!” He heard Loki’s voice radiate from the Stark watch. “Hunters will be unleashed in 55 seconds.” That did nothing to hinder the rise of Bruce’s blood pressure.

****

Carol had taken a lot of turns to the left. She could see the pyramid rising up ahead of her. She recalled Stark’s warning and began to take more paths leading to the right. Staying in the middle didn’t seem that safer but at least it would give them a chance at escaping. If they could time it so that the hunters headed towards the middle, they could maybe try to get to the sides and the safe places.

A gigantic whistle blew and the hairs on the back of Carol’s neck began to rise.

“The Hunters have entered the maze!” Thor roared.

“All right then,” Carol breathed out, “here we go.”

************

2 hours to go

The hunters entered the maze in a much more organized and dignified way than the hunted did. They entered the maze in twos, quickly splitting off when the paths branched off in various directions. The thunder of their uninterrupted pace reached the ears of the hunted who began to quicken their own pace. A few of them gravitated towards the areas around the safe spots. A poor choice, as Tony had predicted as the hunters were rushing ahead towards those zones.

Clint and Rocket had led the chase into the maze, were the first to reach the pyramid area. Darcy, Gamora and Carol were already dashing inside the pyramid which glowed with a golden luminescence under the afternoon light. Peter Parker, who was dashing down an adjacent path towards it, was not so lucky. As soon as he saw Rocket and Clint stopped outside the pyramid, he spun around, his many plastic legs rattling against the hedge, catching slightly, as he did so. Rocket broke into a sprint, following him. Clint remained behind, lurking near the pyramid, waving at those inside.

_Damn damn damn damn damn,_ Peter thought, in a panic, as he took turn after turn through the maze. He could hear the quick, scurrying feat of the racoon alien as it darted around somewhere behind him. He could swear it was chuckling and muttering to itself as it pursued it.

This was certainly the strangest chase of his life (and it had stiff competition) but if he didn’t manage to get the upper hand soon, it would also be the shortest. Peter began to regret his choice of costume. The legs kept catching on the hedges, pulling him back sometimes. Even with his superior speed and agility, the costume was quickly becoming a damn hindrance, fighting back against his superior instincts and physical capabilities. Like trying to manage a getaway on training wheels.

Peter stretched out his arms, dragging himself along whenever the legs caught on it and tried to haul him back. _Dress as a Black Widow spider, it’ll be fun._ Sure, this was all a game but how lame would it be if he was caught within the first ten minutes. Taking deep breaths and forcing himself to pick up more speed, Peter continued taking every sharp turn that the maze offered: left, left, right, second left, right, right, left, right, right and right again. He began to put a little distance between himself and his hunter but he could still hear Rocket somewhere behind him.

Another forked pathway appeared before him. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw another pathway immediately to his right, a very sharp turn. Peter grabbed the legs of his costume, pulled them into him and darted down that pathway. None of his legs caught on the hedge and his efforts became much quieter. He continued to hurry down the path, right up until it ended in hedge.

“Damn,” Peter whispered.

There was no sound behind him and Peter allowed himself to breathe. Hopefully Rocket had gone down another pathway. The patter of small feet in a hurry interrupted him and Peter’s heart began to sink as he turned to face the approaching raccoon.

“Sucks to be you, kid,” Rocket said as he walked forward, “maybe you’ll have better luck in the mansion.”

Peter stepped back. Why, he didn’t know, there was nowhere to go after all. He expected to feel the thick hedge against his back, poking into his costume but instead it was air.

“What the-?” he and Rocket both said aloud as Peter felt himself tipping backward. As he stumbled back, the floor disappeared beneath his feet and he was falling away from Rocket and into darkness. “Wait!” he shouted as the earth above him closed.

He landed in something soft and very liquid.

An overwhelming sweet scent engulfed his nostrils. The liquid, thick and warm, clung to him.

Peter couldn’t see anything around him. There was no light, only this sweet smelling material around him and silence. Peter wrestled within the material, his hands fumbling through it, trying to find something solid to push off from, something to help him get out of it.

“Hello?” Peter called. His voice echoed back quickly and shortly. He wasn’t in a large room. The material also only came up to his knees and he was propped up on his elbows. Once he managed to wriggle himself into a sitting position, the material remained pretty low. “Is anyone there?” he called.

No one answered.

Slowly, orange light began to materialise in front of him, somewhere above whatever he was surrounded in and the darkness above him. The light illuminated the golden brown substance he was surrounded in and the scent became sweeter and more pronounced. Honey. He was sitting in a pot of honey. _What is this? Winnie the Pooh?_ He asked, thinking of T’Challa’s costume. Was he in some kind of honey pot or something? Was anyone else in here?

“Hello?” he called again.

The light grew more and more. Peter stared at it. The source was protected by a large orange frame with some kind of shape cut into it. The light peeked out within the shape.

A pumpkin. It was a freakin’ pumpkin. Peter’s thoughts broke off from obsessing over the oddity of seeing a pumpkin propped up on what looked like a wooden pedestal, in the middle of a pond of honey. Instead, his attention attached itself to the shape of the carving in the middle of the pumpkin. “That’s such a creative pumpkin carving,” he murmured. It was a very intricate carving of the Eiffel Tower. But the Tower was entirely upside down. Peter wondered if the carver had known that when they did this or if they’d worked from an upside down photograph.

Making another attempt to work his hands towards the bottom of the honey, Peter eventually found the floor and pushed upwards, forcing his body out of the honey. This took several attempts as his honey soaked spider legs yanked at his back, under the weight of the honey. Peter wriggled his arms and fumbled with the straps of his costume, forcing them away from him before he scrambled to his feet at last. The absence of the weight drew a long and relieved sigh from him. “So much better,” he mumbled.

He walked through the honey, around the room. It looked to be quite a small cavern. There didn’t seem to be any doors here. He walked back to the pumpkin. Without even thinking about it, he removed the candle in one hand, picked up the pumpkin in the other then placed the candle back down along with the pumpkin over it, Eiffel Tower the correct way up this time.

It was just a small thing and Peter didn’t think much of it until he felt a pull around his navel and the world flipped over and over. He was rising, faster and faster, so fast that he was sure he was about to crash into the earth above him.

But he didn’t crash.

He blinked and found himself on the floor of the maze. Rocket was no longer in front of him. There was a hedge wall in front of him instead of behind him and behind him was a long path, curving round to the right. Peter blinked and looked around. Had he imagined all of that?

The absence of his costume weight and the overpowering scent of honey around him, answered that question.

“Can anyone smell honey?” he heard Rocket ask from a wall or two over.

Peter silently cursed. Time to run again.

***

1 hour 40 minutes to go.

There was a reason why Tony’s many global adventures hadn’t included Egypt. He wasn’t a fan of the pyramids much less the idea of actually going inside one. So, as far as Pepper was concerned, she wasn’t even considering the golden pyramid as a potential safe place for Tony to use.

Instead, she followed the maze pathways until she reached the edge of the woodland area in sight of the bank of the river that acted as a border line. She ducked back a few steps up the pathway, remaining just out of sight of anyone in the area itself.

Around the maze, she heard people laughing and calling out taunts to each other, shouting and crying out as they pursued or evaded capture. Swear words called out in laughter and the occasional shout of victory or defeat rang through the air. “No! Come on!” She thought she heard Carol shout out and then a cry of “Yes!” followed, along with the sounds of two pairs of feet running. So Carol had avoided the magnetic connection, it seemed. Pepper didn’t follow the sound of Carol’s voice. She just left her pursuer to it. Instead she lingered, chancing glances where she could. Tony was most likely already here. It wasn’t too soon in the game and no doubt he wanted the time and safe space to come up with a strategy. If she could get him now, she could curtail that nicely.

Pepper smiled as she leaned back against the hedge. She hadn’t played a game this energetic and athletic since college when she played on their lacrosse team. She had forgotten what it felt like, to have the adrenaline and enjoyment of the game powering you through, intensifying everything. Hearing everyone running about shouting and laughing, it was a wonderful lift after the heaviness of recent events: saving the world over and over, taking down Thanos and Hydra. It was just what everyone needed, a chance to let off some steam and enjoy themselves. They might have a responsibility but life was too short not to stop and have fun now and again. Besides, hiccups aside, of today, it was pretty entertaining listening to the clash of personalities.

A shadow moved out of the corner of her eye. Without even looking properly, she recognised the somewhat shorter frame of her fiance. The Joker costume was also pretty eye-catching too. Tucking her angel wings in somewhat, Pepper took off in a run after Tony. Aziraphale’s costume wasn’t the easiest thing to run around in. Pepper kind of wished she’d just gone with the white suit alone, without the wings. At any rate, Tony wasn’t running desperately fast and Pepper was soon catching up to him, keeping him in her eye line as he took sharp turns.

At one point Tony completely disappeared. Pepper rounded the corner and found herself at a fork in the road. She looked down both paths, growling low to herself as she struggled to choose between them. She tried to imagine Tony’s choice. Was there a pattern to the directions he took? No, she didn’t think so. Besides, knowing Tony, he might have anticipated that someone might try and analyze his patterns. Sighing once, Pepper decided to leave it to chance. She hurried to the left.

As she ran, parts of the hedge began to transform themselves into mirrors. But it wasn’t Pepper in her Aziraphale costume that she saw, but her childhood self, maybe around eight or nine, swinging around in the tyre swing her dad had attached to their gigantic apple tree. Her blonde hair was swinging around her like wild curtains and her small, rounded face was full of laughter and excitement. Pepper slowed to a stop, transfixed by what she saw. Her younger self, looked up in Pepper’s direction and laughed at her, like she could see her. A shadow moved out in front of Pepper’s view. She recognised the shape of her dad as he ran over to push the tyre swing round. Her younger self’s laughter rang out higher.

_I want that,_ Pepper smiled to herself, _I want that with Tony._

The image disappeared back into the hedge and Pepper remembered what she was supposed to be doing. She began to move again. Further on, another image appeared in the hedge. This time it was her as a college student, playing in one of the final lacrosse games. She smiled at it but this time she didn’t stop. These images were appearing to distract her. Maybe I chose the right path after all, Pepper thought.

The next turn had five images materializing in the walls. Pepper passed her Halloween party when she was 13, her prom, her interview with Stark Industries and the first time she managed to successfully match her mother’s cherry pie recipe. She laughed as she glanced at the smiling faces of her past.

She followed the turn left and collided with purple and green.

Tony stumbled backwards. Pepper was the first to right herself. “Gotcha!” she declared as she grabbed Tony’s wrist and their emeralds touched. She felt a pulse go from her wrist through to a smiling Tony who made an attempt to pull away but continued to grin when he was unable to do so.

“Nice hunting, Miss Potts,” he told her, his eyes moving down to her lips. Pepper stepped in a little closer. Tony’s head tilted, his face moving towards hers.

“I always get my quarry, Mr Stark,” Pepper teased before their lips met.

***

1 hour 30 minutes to go

“This is overkill!” Darcy shrieked, half laughing as she raced down the leftmost of a trio of pathways open to her. In front of her vines, began to form just a little off the ground, becoming thicker and twisting against each other. Darcy leapt over them nimbly. This was so cool, a magic maze with tricks and treats for hunter and hunted alike. When the maze didn’t seem to be trying to break Darcy’s neck, it seemed to be encouraging her either. Sometimes the pathways were different temperatures, with the warmer ones appealing to her. Sometimes they had a distinctive smell. Darcy had ran down a honey scented pathway only to narrowly avoid crashing into a hunter.

The sounds of her pursuers continued to pound the stone pathway behind her. “This is freakin’ overkill!” Darcy repeated again as she jumped another vine. Behind her, she had the blue alien Drax, the Earth wizard Dr Strange (Darcy was saying nothing) and Steve Rogers on her tail. Ordinarily, Darcy would love for Captain America to be chasing her (and he looked completely awesome and adorable as Dennis the Menace too) but right now with three hunters on her, that probably meant that two hunted were getting off scot free.

On her right, the hedge began to open, enough for her to slide in. She did so, just as it shut behind her, closing off the pathway to her pursuers.

“Yes!” Darcy pumped her fist close to her chest. Not too far away, she could see the pyramid ahead. She’d already stayed in there at the start. She’d tried to make it to the copse but the maze had not been on her side. Darcy felt like she’d run the whole thing with all the twists and hidden pathways she’d found. She wished she was wearing her fitbit. How many steps would this be? That would have been an epic step count at the end. But typical, it was back home charging.

She turned down a pathway and was met by silence from the nearby walls. Darcy allowed herself to slow down and catch her breath. Okay, time to be careful. There were probably hunters about, waiting to ambush her getting into the pyramid. That’s what she would have done if she was a hunter. (Which, by the way, she’d wanted to be but hey.)

Darcy walked down another path. The pyramid grew golder and bigger as she approached it. Another turn and she was so close to the final pathway. One more to go. At last! There it was, calling to Darcy in all its fabulous glory. Darcy approached it, taking slow careful steps and keeping an ear out for those around her.

No one was stood lurking near the entrance. Now was her chance. She darted forward. Or, she tried to.

Her feet stopped and Darcy flailed forwards, grabbing onto the hedge walls, making them rustle as she just about caught her balance. “The fuck-?” Darcy willed her feet to move, but they couldn’t. There was a great weighty feeling holding them down. She looked down at her feet. A sticky black substance was clinging at the bottom of her shoes, holding them to the ground. “Oh come on!” Darcy yanked at her feet just as footsteps materialized in front of her. Darcy looked up to see Drax stepping through a hole in the hedge on her left. Traitor, Darcy thought to the maze.

Drax was smiling at her. “You are my captive now. It’s time to go to the mansion.” He touched his strap to hers and Darcy felt a magnetic pulse move through her body. Her feet lost the strange sensation and Darcy watched the substance retreat into the ground. Drax took her arm and began to lead her down the pathway.

“Dude, you don’t need to drag me,” Darcy complained as she stumbled alongside him. “I can’t exactly get away.”

“I am taking no chances,” Drax said. “You are a wily young woman.”

Darcy grinned herself. “Wily?” she repeated. “I like that.”

Drax smiled at her. “You would do well in our group. Not many people can outrun me and other hunters.”

“Thanks,” Darcy told him. “The maze helped a bit.”

“The maze is a treacherous foe. What it helps you with, it can hinder later.”

“Yeah I’m getting that,” Darcy grumbled.

Drax’s instincts seemed to be quite good. Within fifteen minutes, he had located the path that led to the mansion. The stone pathway transformed to cobble stones as they reached the driveway of the magnificent mansion. Two stories tall with Grecian pills, it looked like your typical classical mansion. The building sat on a tall, grassy hill with many ivory steps cut into the hill, leading up to the gigantic wooden doors. All of the windows were black with no curtains. Darcy half expected to see a pale spooky face or a monstrous one peer out at her. But nothing did. Drax led her up the many stone steps towards the entrance.

“I wish you luck,” Drax said as he pushed open the door and half stepped inside. Darcy stepped fully in and felt the magnetic feeling disappear. Drax gently pushed her further in.

Darcy turned around to him. “Oh I’m coming out,” she said. “I’ll see you later.”

He grinned at her. “I hope so.” With that, he closed the door.

Darcy was left alone in the darkness. Not a sound could be heard. No creaking furniture, no bone chilling chimes or rushes of wind. Everything was still. That made Darcy nervous.

She took one step then another. They made soft thudding sounds. She reached out her hands. Her foot knocked into some kind of table leg. She navigated around it, squinting in the darkness. She lifted her hands higher, advancing forwards when nothing else got into her way. A couple of hundred yards away, lights manifested in the room.

A dozen candles flickered to life. They floated above the banister of a great staircase that took up most of a very large entrance hall. Torches on the walls flared to life. An archway to Darcy’s left showed her an extravagant looking lounge, furnished in a style that reminded her of classical French royalty. There was another archway to her right. Through it, she could see the shapes of many instruments: pianos, violins, harps etc. In the far corners of the entrance hall beyond the staircase, two doorways stood. Both were polished wood with golden borders. One door had a carving of a snake on the front, the other door a wolf.

Common sense dictated that the exit to the mansion would be on the ground floor and yet that seemed too easy for a mansion that probably held just as many tricks as the maze did. But still, Darcy walked up to the doorway of the snake and shook the handle. The door wouldn’t budge. She pushed and pulled but the door remained locked. Darcy tried the same with the wolf door. Similar progress was made there and so Darcy returned to the foot of the stairs. The floating candles reminded her of Hogwarts and so were mildly reassuring. But even so, Darcy’s pulse was quickening now as she stepped onto the first stair. If this was a challenge then something up here had to be the key to getting out.

Darcy took another step upstairs.

She plummeted down, feet first and fast. A cry escaped from her lips and she flung her arms out, grabbing the nearest railing. The sensation only lasted a second as soon as her middle touched the stair. “Holy shit,” Darcy cursed as she looked down at herself, stuck in the stairway. “What the actual fuck-?” she began to cry out.

_“What was never scared but became petrified, can't make a bird but can make a bat, can't live in a house but would die to have one. What is it?”_ Loki’s voice sounded from above her and around her, as though he was everywhere. Darcy blinked up at the candles and the empty entrance hall around her.

“What?”

_“What was never scared but became petrified, can't make a bird but can make a bat, can't live in a house but would die to have one. What is it?”_ Loki’s voice repeated.

Darcy blinked rapidly, processing the question. “A riddle? Really?!” she bit down on another curse. Damn. Riddles were a mixed bag with her.

“Uh… give me a minute,” Darcy muttered as she thought about it. “Never scared but petrified? Harry Potter basilisk victims? No, that’s too easy. Can’t make a bird but can make a bat. Uh… what the fuck makes birds and bats? Um…. Wait no… bad as in wooden bat? Wood. Die to make a house? Uh…” the answer hit Darcy like a bat over the head. “A tree!” she declared. “Trees die to make wooden houses.”

She felt a tug around her navel and she began to lift up, out of the stair, landing on a considerably more solid stair now. Darcy let out a short whistle before grinning.

“Okay, that was kind of fun.”

She continued to climb up more of the stairs. She wondered if anyone else was here yet. It was kind of over-the-top for a haunted house so far but she also kind of loved it. “We all go a little mad sometimes,” she told herself with a smile.

***

1 hour 10 minutes to go

“I am Groot, I am Groot.” Groot mumbled to himself as he darted through the maze. He’d taken so many turns and side paths throughout the maze that he had lost track of where he’d started from or where he was going. He was still very young and still growing. He was just about able to look up and see where the nearest safe place was. The last time he had looked up, he was near the pyramid. But now, it was the mansion that was looking uncomfortably close. “I am Groot,” he swore and turned to take a path leading away from here.

As he raced along several pathways, his heightened hearing picked up a familiar pattering of feet. Small feet. The kind that were attached to his best friend/father figure, Rocket. Rocket who was very good at hunting things. Groot started taking more and more paths that led away from those noises.

Right, left, right, left, right, left, right, right and-

“I AM GROOT!” Groot roared as he collided with a thin, bespectacled man in a pirate costume. He fell back onto the floor while the other man just stumbled backwards.

“Watch where you’re going!” The man declared. Groot recognized him now. Bruce Banner. Prone to turning into a repulsive, green thing.

“I am Groot,” Groot told him where he could shove that advice. He had been looking.

“Yes, I know your name is Groot,” Bruce sighed. Groot rolled his eyes. Maybe one of these days the other humans would bother to learn his language.

Groot picked himself up and pointed behind him at the mansion. “I am Groot. I am Groot.” He pointed out the proximity of the mansion and therefore the idiocy in continuing in this direction. He watched Bruce take in the sight of the mansion and sigh.

“Yes I can see it,” he said. “But there are hunters coming this way.” He gestured behind him and Groot swore in a low voice.

He looked behind him where more voices were coming closer. Groot could hear Quill shouting something and Wanda taunting him about not being able to outrun her. Groot looked at his fellow hunter and raised his arms. They were kind of stuffed either way they went.

“I think we should go…” Bruce began.

“I am…” Groot began too.

“…that way.” Banner pointed toward the mansion.

“… Groot.” Groot pointed back the way that Bruce had come.

Banner frowned. “Fine, you go that way then. I’m telling you, there’s at least three hunters back that way.”

“I am Groot.” Groot made sure to lace his words with as much of an offensive tone as possible. He charged forwards, to go past Banner. But as soon as he did, he felt a forceful energy soaring over him, holding him onto the spot. He looked down to see a luminous energy encircling his and Banner’s feet. The floor disappeared and for a second, Groot’s feet flailed in the air. His stomach lifted and then he was falling. “IIIIIIII ammmmmm Grooooooootttttt,” he cried as he fell.

“Whhhaaaat?” Bruce shouted as he fell too. They slid down a tunnel of kaleidoscopic light and colours. It was slower than the bifrost but just as colourful and dizzying. They swirled around and around each other in the tunnel, over and over until they reached a circle of darkness. They shot through it and landed hard in darkness, on a rough stone ground.

“Ouch.”

“I am Groot.”

There was only one source of light, a flicker of it at the end of the room. The rest of the room was so dark that Groot had trouble distinguishing anything. He heard Bruce scrambling about next to him, as well as taking some deep breaths. It occurred to Groot that it was a horrible idea for Banner to transform in this unfamiliar, dark environment.

“I am Groot,” he tried for a soothing tone.

“I still can’t understand you!” Banner’s voice sounded anxious and stressed.

“It’s okay, big guy.” Tony Stark’s voice sounded from the other end of the room. “I’m here. It’s okay.” The flicker of light moved closer and Tony Stark approached them both, holding a candle.

“Oh good, it’s you,” Bruce said with a relieved smile flickering over his features.

“How’d you get here? Who caught you?” Tony asked as he neared them. He looked over at Groot and nodded with a small smile. “Hey Groot.”

“I am Groot.” Groot tried to explain that no one had brought them, that the maze did it. But Tony didn’t look as though that message had gotten to him.

“Good to see you, buddy,” was all he said.

Bruce shook his head. “No one brought us here. We were in the maze and this tunnel just brought us here.”

Tony whistled. “Nice. So the maze is doing the hunters’ job as well. Nice of Loki to mention that. Not.” He looked between Bruce and Groot. “Pepper brought me in.” Both Bruce and Groot cackled at that and Tony shook his head with a smile. “Yes, hahaha, brought in by the fiancee.”

“I wouldn’t have expected anything less of Pepper,” he said. He looked around the room. “Where is this room?”

“I think we’re inside one of the basement rooms,” Tony told them. “As soon as Pepper led me in, I sort of went down this slide and ended up in another room, next door to this one.” He shone the candle around. There didn’t seem to be much to see except stone walls and an empty floor. “We should probably get going. We have to get out of here before we can get back in the maze. And whatever you do, avoid Pepper at all costs.”

Bruce laughed as he nodded. “Let’s get going then.”

***

1 hour to go

Ten minutes later found Darcy finally reaching the top of the stairs. Every third step had had a trick, a riddle or some other special effect on it even when Darcy tried to avoid the step itself, the next step had sucked her down again. So far she’d had been coated with some kind of weird fish spray, had to recite the Spanish alphabet, answered a riddle about the days of the week and had spiders crawling all over her. As soon as she was on that top step, she pushed herself away from the staircase, breathing hard as she did.

The staircase branched out in two directions. Ivory hallways with furnished with wooden side tables, portraits and exotic smelling vases of flowers met Darcy’s gaze in both directions. Both of them were equally well lit with wall torches, casting a beautiful glow over everything. Darcy looked between the two directions before settling for left. She tried to listen for any other sounds, like voices of other Hunted who had been brought here. She couldn’t be the first one, right? How lame would that be?

She reached the first doorway on the left and pushed it open. Inside was a plain bedroom with an open treasure chest at the foot of the bed. A skeleton lay in the chest, one leg and arm hanging out of it. As Darcy looked at it, it jerked to life, its eye sockets glowing green, making Darcy yelp as its eyes fixed on her at once.

“Holy fuck!” she complained as it shook itself, wriggling its way out of the chest, eyes still on her. “You stay right over there, Captain Creepy.”

The skeleton climbed out of the chest and began to stumble over to her, like a baby walking for the first time. Darcy closed the door on it and kept hold of the handle. Nothing happened, not even an experimental rattle. Darcy waited a minute or two and nothing happened. She then pushed the door open a little and gasped.

The room was entirely empty. Darcy looked around herself, expecting to see the skeleton appear again. She closed the door once more and then went to open it again. This time the door remained shut, locked now. Darcy rattled it a few times before backing away.

“Freaky place,” she muttered and turned towards the next door, this one on the right. A wave of royal blue gas rushed out at her. She was engulfed by it. The smell of chocolate washed over her. Darcy found herself both choking and trying to breathe it in all at once for many long seconds. After her fit had subsided, she looked back towards the door but it was gone, replaced by wall. Darcy stared at it. “Oh my freaking god,” she muttered, “what even is this place?”

The doors down the rest of this wing of this hall seemed ordinary enough, a collection of bedrooms dressed for Halloween with cobwebs, pumpkins and skeleton heads dangling from the ceiling. Nothing out of the ordinary and yet Darcy’s suspicions grew. Compared to everything else that she’d seen, these things seemed strangest of all.

***

55 minutes to go

Pietro missed his speed. Badly.

As he raced through the maze, chasing the sweeping cloak of Bucky’s costume, Pietro tried to remember the last time he had run properly like this. It must have been before the experiments, he knew that well enough, but trying to pinpoint the exact run was difficult. Perhaps it had been the morning of the experiments. Strucker might have set up a session then, or maybe he was thinking of the night before. At any rate, it had been a long time since he had been pushing himself without the advantage of being able to move much faster while doing so. He had always kept himself reasonably fit so he could keep up with Bucky fairly well.

What made it unfair was Bucky’s own enhancement yet the Asgardians hadn’t made him wear an enhancement. Then again, it wasn’t in the same league as Pietro but it was still a sore spot seeing someone else make use of their enhancements when he was unable to use his. Pietro channeled his frustration into his speed, pushing himself harder and harder.

He could hear Bucky laughing ahead of him. He ran past an opening, realising too late that Bucky had gone down it. Pietro turned to change course, only for Bucky to pelt out, full speed, back the way they had come. Pietro swore in Sokovian.

Pietro was just building his speed up again, following his target through the winding maze, when a blur of red and black smacked into him, knocking him backwards. Pietro hit the ground, sending his vision and head into a flurry of blurs and distorted sounds. Everything collected itself in time to see Natasha grin at him before getting up and running off.

“Cheeky bitch,” he growled and looked back the way he’d come. He’d lost Bucky now and there was Natasha as well. He looked between the two directions before he heard footsteps approaching at a sprint. He turned, arms out, ready to catch whichever unlucky hunted had ran into him.

Wanda crashed into his arms and Pietro took hold of her arms to steady her as she scrambled for balance.

“Pietro!” she growled at him.

“Sorry!”

Wanda stepped back and pushed him aside. “Which way did she go?”

“Natasha? Left, I think. Seen. Bucky?”

“Right!” Wanda called back as she set off. Pietro grinned after her, mood bolstered a bit as he renewed his efforts to chase down the Ripper.

As if the maze was responding to his thoughts, several walls began to disintegrate in front of him, exposing four rows of paths in front of him. Bucky was on the furthest one and he stumbled to a stop when he saw what was happening. Gamora and Rhodey also looked around startled. Rhodey managed to break off into another run but Stephen, who was in the row behind Gamora, stepped across and got Gamora magnetized. The two appeared to be arguing heavily.

Pietro paid no heed to it. He was already sprinting over towards Bucky who turned to run off, only to find his pathway closing up in front of him. He side stepped sharply at the last minute, causing Pietro to crash into the hedge. Pietro heard Bucky’s disappearing footsteps. But when he turned to look where he was running off to, he found himself quickly being surrounded by growing hedge.

“Who’s side are you on?!”

***  
50 minutes to go

The two scientists and the alien tree followed the nearest set of stairs up to a door that opened out onto a darkened room. The windows were painted black, offering virtually no light. Beyond this room was a somewhat lit entrance hall which cast a little light on some of the furniture in their current room. Luxurious chaises and a glass coffee table occupied the central place in the room. Further back, near the walls was an assortment of plants and bronze statues. The group navigated their way through to the entrance hall.

“Check the doors,” Bruce said and made for a door with a wolf carving, Tony walked to one with a snake carving. Groot approached the front door.

“Come on kid,” Tony said as he looked back at Groot. “That’s not gonna work. Loki’s not stupid.”

Groot put his hand on the door handle. An icy sensation rushed through him, filling up his body instantly and the tree-being staggered back. “I am Grooooot.”

Tony looked over from where he was tugging at the door handle. “I told you it wouldn’t work! What’s wrong with you?”

“I am Groot.”

Tony shook his head and looked over at Bruce. “Any luck your end?”

“Nope.” Bruce walked back towards the staircase. “We better look upstairs.” Tony and Groot joined him. “There’s bound to be all kinds of shit up here. We’re inside Loki’s brain child now. Gotta keep our wits about.”

“Those of us who have any left,” Tony said.

“I am Groot,” Groot growled.

They set off up the first few steps. Partway up, a kind of electricity wrapped around their legs and held them in place. “Told you!” Bruce yelled as his legs began to convulse.

_“What is the difference between a school boy studying and a farmer watching his cattle?”_ Loki’s voice rang out, echoing around the walls.

“What?” Bruce asked.

_“What is the difference between a school boy studying and a farmer watching his cattle?”_ Loki’s voice repeated.

“A riddle,” Tony said. “Really? You want us to riddle our way out of this?”

“No no, that’s okay,” Bruce said, snapping his fingers and trying not to let his words shake along with his legs. “We can do riddles. There’s a few of us here. We can work together.”

“Only two of us speak English,” Tony reminded him.

Bruce paused. “Well… I’m sure Groot can help somehow. Hey!” he snapped when he saw Groot roll his eyes at him. “We’re going to get out of this together, right?”

“Right,” Tony said.

“I am Groot.”

“I hope that’s “Right” in Groot,” said Tony.

Bruce looked around the room. “Can we have that question again please?”

_“What is the difference between a school boy studying and a farmer watching his cattle?”_

Bruce began to think. “Damn I’ve not heard that one.”

Tony leaned one hand against the bannister, the other running his fingers over his face.

Several minutes passed as they both thought hard. Groot began to produce some wood from his hand, letting it spread out into a thin kind of board. He then grew a small stick from his side and snapped it off with a wince. He began to scratch down the answer, before holding it out to Bruce who read it with surprise. “Are you for real?” he asked.

Groot nodded. “I am Groot.”

Tony read the scratchings and shrugged. “Worth a try.”

Bruce looked up. “One is stocking his mind. The other is minding his stock.”

The electricity around them began to subside and the three of them began to scramble up the next few stairs.

“Nice going kid,” Tony said patting Groot on the shoulder.

Several steps up, they all sank through the stair entirely. Blackness consumed them.

The only sounds were their cries as they fell through a strange and unfriendly void, their echoes spreading out far around them. They spun in slow motion, over and over until up and down and sideways became meaningless and confusing. They fell through this darkness for about a minute before they fell out again.

Groot landed first with Bruce on top of him and then Tony fell to the other side. They’d landed in an elegantly decorated hallway with expensive portraits and cabinets. It was well lit with plenty of wall torches and purple and gold patterned rugs decorated the floor.

On the other side of the hall was Darcy who was peering into one of the rooms.

“Darcy!” Tony called.

Darcy looked over, her face colouring in relief as the billionaire jogged up to her. “Yes! I’m not alone, good!” she cheered. “How long have you guys been in here?”

Tony looked back at the others. “20 minutes?” he looked back at his watch. “Yeah about 20 minutes.” He turned to Darcy. “What about you?”

“Feels like years,” Darcy murmured. She rubbed the back of her neck and looked to Groot. “Hey Groot!” she said with a grin, walking up to him. “You doing okay?”

“I am Groot!”

Darcy nodded, her face scrunching up. “Well that’s rough. It’s okay now though.”

Tony looked between the two of them. “Can you understand him?”

“Yeah. Thor taught me,” Darcy shrugged. She folded her arms as a cold wind blew through the hall. “Should we stick together? If we stick together, we all have a chance at getting back in the game.”

“Yeah I’m up for that,” Bruce agreed.

“Sounds good,” Tony said. “Splitting up in Loki’s house of nuts is not an option. What about you, Groot?”

“I am Groot.”

The two human men looked at Darcy. “He’s in,” she said.

The four of them, grouped together, began to make their way along the hall. As they walked, they filled the others in on what they’d missed, exchanging stories about the riddles, the strange skeleton in the room and the odd blue gas as well as the tunnel that had brought Groot and Bruce into the mansion without a hunter being involved. Several rooms on this corridor were locked, all except for the last.

When they stepped inside, they saw an unfurnished room, grey and dull like a prison cell. A metal bathtub sat in the middle. It was filled with water and many red apples were floating in it. Bruce advanced on the tub, his expression disbelieving.

“Bobbing for apples? Really?”

Tony leaned in and examined the water which looked especially dark in the limited light coming through from the hallway. He sniffed the area around the floating apples. While he gazed into the waters, Groot began to circle the tub. He reached in and touched the water with his finger.

“Is it okay?” Tony asked. Groot nodded.

“I am Groot.”

“It’s just cold,” Darcy supplied.

Suddenly the door slammed shut, taking most of the light with it. Darcy and Bruce ran to the door but the handle wouldn’t turn. They banged, kicked and hit at the door over and over but all that did was give them sore hands and, after a few minutes, they stopped, rubbing their wrists. Groot was now circling the water again and Tony stood there, stroking his goatee, his eyes especially dark as he stood there brooding.

“For god’s sake, now what?” Darcy demanded. She tried the handle once more. Nothing.

Tony began to pace across the room. “This has to have something to do with the tub and the apples. Someone, Loki, wants us to do bobbing for apples.”

“Really?” Bruce made no effort to hide his skepticism. “You think he’s just gonna let us go after we play a harmless game like this? This is Loki we’re talking about.”

“He let us up here after we solved some riddles,” Darcy pointed out. “He’s got weird ass skeletons and chocolate smoke floating about. Weird isn’t out of character for him.” She pointed out. “Besides,” she said, looking at her watch, “we’ve got forty minutes left.”

Bruce clasped his hands behind his neck and sighed. “Okay, fine. Fine, let’s play.” He went to stand around the tub. Instantly his hands moved behind his back, tied up. When Tony, Groot and Darcy took their positions, they found their hands similarly bound. “I guess that saves time then,” Bruce said before lowering his face to the water. The others did the same.

Despite how many apples were floating around, it was pretty difficult for them to actually get the apples out. The fruit slid away from their faces and mouths lost their grip, causing the fruit to splash back into the water. They fumbled around, trying and trying again with different apples .After about five minutes, Bruce managed to get one apple out of the tub. He dropped it onto the floor and went back for another. Seconds later, Tony lifted another one out. Groot got another one, just as Bruce was retrieving his third one.

Darcy had just latched onto one when she saw a glint of sparkling gold floating around the water, near the surface. She dropped the apple and dived for the golden object. It took her a couple of tries but she managed to get hold of it. She straightened up, the golden object hanging out of her mouth. Her restraints vanished and she took the object into her hand. It was a key. She watched the others realise their bonds were no longer there.

“I think we just got us a way out,” Darcy grinned as she held up the key.

Once the door was unlocked, they spilled back into the hallway. One of the previously locked doors was now open. There was just one problem.

Actually, there were seven of them.

Seven scarecrows stood in front of the open door. Their smiles were like razer teeth, their black eye sockets like glinting onyx gems. They wore dirty sacks and grey slacks with straw poking out their middles and their leather boots.They moved forward in perfect unison. Their heads tilted to one side, making their smiles look even more crazed.

“Okay, cos that’s not creepy at all,” Bruce muttered.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Darcy stepped back.

“Of course there’s a gang of scarecrows waiting for us. Of course.” Tony snapped.

The front row raised their hands. A fiery orange energy burned in their dirty cloth fingers. Groot stepped behind Darcy. Tony and Bruce stepped in closer too. Bruce exhaled softly, muttering something about his blood pressure. The row of scarecrows stepped forward.

“They’re not going to do anything,” Darcy said. “It’s just for show. It’ll just be fancy lights, completely harmle-”

The second scarecrow from the left threw their ball of light. It narrowly missed Darcy’s head and crashed into the door behind her. The door exploded and the three humans and alien were blasted forward, falling at the feet of the scarecrows who simultaneously turned their gazes down on them. Now both rows of them had their arms raised with fiery power radiating from their palms, including the one that had blasted the door apart.

“How’s that theory going?” Tony asked as he rolled to the side, out of the lines of fire. Bruce, now on his knees, took hold of the rug. Darcy saw that all the scarecrows were standing on it. She and Groot scooted off just as Bruce yanked it. The scarecrows immediately unbalanced and tumbled together, giving the hunted a chance to get to their feet. “Through the door now,” Tony pushed Darcy forward, then Groot. He and Bruce followed after them, slamming the door after them.

They were in a pitch black corridor. Darcy knocked into something. “Fuck!”

“I am Groot.”

“I don’t know where the light is!” Darcy retorted.

“No time to turn them on. Activate the Stark watch,” Tony said.

“You what?” Darcy asked.

“Inbuilt light… you didn’t know that?”

“Jeez, I must have missed the manual,” Darcy grumbled. She looked to the Stark watch on her wrist. “Light up.” Her watch immediately glowed a luminescent blue. Out of the darkness, she saw Groot, Tony and Bruce’s faces light up inside the dark. She fought back the wave of nausea that gathered in her throat. Her memories of ghostly campfire stories were quickly swallowed up by the sound of scraping and scratching noises outside the door.

“Move!” Bruce cried out and they began to run. The immediate surroundings weren’t illuminated enough to show much more than a couple of cabinets and pedestals and a door at the very end of the hall. They threw themselves through it, shutting the door just as they heard the other door opening.

The next room was dimly lit. A great tapestry ran around the walls, surrounded by a rich red background. In the tapestry were depictions of many creatures. Some of them were traditional Halloween frights like werewolves, witches and zombies. But there were also creatures that Darcy had never seen before such as gigantic creatures with antlers, walking on two legs. There were also six-headed serpent creatures that looked uncomfortably like the Hydra symbol. At the end of the room were four rickety looking compartments. They reminded Darcy of the old style elevators that hotels used to have. Only these compartments weren’t wide enough to hold more than one person in.

_Funny how there’s exactly four of them,_ Darcy realised, horrified.

Footsteps were sounding louder and louder from the other side of the door. Their straw friends were catching up faster than she’d expected. Next to Darcy, Tony was looking between the door and the elevator things. “This has trap painted all over it,” he remarked.

Darcy flung herself forward, getting into the first compartment. “Well I’d rather take my chances with this creaky thing than those freaky things.”

“Well said.” Bruce said as he got into another.

“I am Groot, I am Groot.”

Tony looked to Darcy who grimaced.

“He said this wouldn’t have happened if he hadn’t gotten involved with you.”

“I am Groot.”

“And you got him into this trouble.”

“_Excuse_ me?” Tony whirled around on Groot who was getting into one of the elevator compartments. “When did I get any kind of control over what happened to us today? You need to take your head right out of your-” Tony fired at him.

“Tony, get in the _elevator_.” Darcy hissed.

Tony still looked decisive but the footsteps were growing louder and more frequent now. Finally, he stepped into it himself.

“How do we operate these things?” Bruce asked. A second later and his compartment suddenly dropped. He shot down with a scream.

Darcy began to fumble with her own elevator door. “Oh fuck no, I’m getting out of he-AGH!” she screamed too as her elevator suddenly zoomed downwards. She heard Groot shouting before she fell out of sight.

***

30 minutes to go.

“Who’s in the mansion now?” Clint caught up with Sam who, dressed in his Achilles outfit, was lurking around the entrance to the pyramid. “I’ve just taken Parker and Rhodey there. Rhodey got unlucky and ran into the kid. Honey’s pretty sticky,” the archer laughed as he stopped beside Sam.

“I smelled that; it was great,” Sam grinned, leaning back into the hedge. “Not sure Rhodey thought so.” He looked over at the fence. “So far I think it’s Darcy, Tony, Gamora, Quill and Happy. Don’t know how many are still in there now. Loki says there’s plenty to occupy then in there.”

“The longer they stay in there, the better for us. Anyway, I thought I heard Bruce and Groot in there earlier,” Clint said. “Wonder which badass brought Bruce in?”

“Someone with more courage than sense if you ask me,” Sam muttered. ”Imagine if he’d hulked out.”

“Don’t have to imagine it,” Clint slapped Sam on the arm, “I’ve seen my fair share. So no one’s grabbed Natasha yet?”

“Nope,” Sam popped the p. “She’s due out of here any moment now.”

Clint eyed the entrance with a grin. “You sure? She’s probably slipped out.”

“Nah I’ve been here for about five minutes now. No way has she come out yet.”

“Why isn’t her thing going off then?” Clint countered. “For being in there too long?” Sam began to frown and he looked back towards the pyramid. Clint began to chuckle. He patted his friend’s arm. “So naive, my friend,” he said. “So naive.”

***

25 minutes to go

Darcy’s scream intensified as the door to her rickety metal compartment opened. A great wind wrapped around her and pulled her out. She fell, unprotected, further into the dark.

The scream tore at her throat, straining her vocal chords. The darkness seemed to go on forever. She felt like she was in that scene from Journey to the Center of the Earth where they’re falling for ages inside the volcano. Except those people could at least see where they were falling. As the seconds raced by, Darcy wasn’t sure if that was a blessing nor not.

Finally the fall was broken by something extremely soft and Darcy bounced from one cushioned thing to another, dropping lower and lower until she landed on a carpeted floor. She lay in the dark, hugging the carpet with her body.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she whispered. She lifted her wrist and the Stark light illuminated her immediate surroundings. She lay in front of a circle of gigantic stuffed animals ranging from pandas to bears, to parrots and rabbits. They were about the same size as her once she knelt up, sitting back on her shins. Behind them were even larger ones, the sizes of doors. Darcy blinked. “Um… land of the stuffed, much?”

“I know right?”

Darcy turned towards the voice, recognising it. A sickly sweet smell of honey hit her nostrils as she recognised Peter Parker climbing through to her circle. From where he was coming from, she could see more stuffed animals facing away from her. Peter waved once he’d finished climbing through and found his feet on the floor again.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” Darcy said. She wrinkled her nose. “Did you take a bath in honey?”

“No, I fell in a pit of it.”

“A giant honey pot? Winnie the Pooh much?”

Peter laughed as he came to sit down next to her. “I know right? I thought that. Thought it seemed a bit tame for Loki’s tricks.” He looked around the room. “I just got in the mansion and the floor like opened up. It was crazy.”

“Welcome to Loki’s house of crazy.”

“Thanks,” Peter said. “What do you suppose we have to do here?”

“I dunno. I’m just glad to get away from the psycho scarecrows,” Darcy said.

“Psycho scarecrows?”

Darcy filled him in and Peter looked considerably paler as he took in that information and looked around. The pair of them were silent for a while. Nothing seemed to be happening in the room and Darcy was beginning to wonder what this challenge was, if there would even be one. Maybe this was them failing the challenges and being stuck here. She didn’t want to think that but as the minutes passed, she couldn’t help but wonder.

“Do you believe in ghosts?” Peter suddenly asked.

Darcy looked over her. “Not normally but… anything’s possible here, I guess.” She brought her knees up in front of her. “What about you?”

Peter shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. Guess I always thought it was possible. Sometimes it felt like my Uncle Ben was walking beside me, watching me. But I don’t know.”

“I believe in that,” Darcy murmured, resting her chin on her folded arms on her knees. “People watching over you, still being around kind of. I just don’t think they can come back properly as ghosts you can see. I think it’s nice to believe in them being there, makes it easier.”

Peter nodded. More silence followed as they gazed around the room.

***

20 minutes to go

Carol leaped across the river, crash landing in the grass and breathing in the sanctuary of the safe spot as she looked back over towards T’Challa and Steve.

“How the hell has she been keeping this up for an hour and a half?” Steve panted as he clutched his sides, his black wig sliding partway down his face.

T’Challa wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his wing, panting just as hard. “We got distracted taking everyone else in. That Erik guy’s been hiding from us too. Bucky’s been pretty lucky too.” He said as he turned away from the copse safe place. “I’m going to go and find Erik. His luck’s gotta run out sometime especially at his age.”

Steve patted T’Challa’s arm. “You go do that. Leave Carol to me.”

T’Challa grinned. “Good luck, you will need it.”

Steve gave him a playful shove. “Not this time. She’s not getting away again.”

“She, Natasha and Erik have been doing a great job with managing exactly that,” T’Challa said. “So I will believe that when I see it.” He hurried off, his feathers disappearing around the hedge as he rounded the bend.

Steve turned back to Carol who was now sitting on the bank waving at him. He folded his arms. “Gotta give you props for your game,” he called to her.

Carol laughed and saluted. “You too, Cap. You’re good. But I’ve had a lot of experience outrunning people trying to kill me. So’ve Bucky and Natasha. You’re in for a rough time.”

“I think we can handle that,” From around the bend of the maze, Nick arrived at a jog. He pointed at Carol. “You ain’t getting away this time.”

Carol grinned.

Like Pietro and Wanda, she’d been given a limiter on her wrist, which made her overall success in this game even more humiliating for the hunters. Even with her handicapped, she’d evaded capture for the entire game. Steve also liked to call that dumb luck. But there were more hunters compared to hunted now. There were loads of hunted in the mansion and so far no one had managed to escape yet. Loki’s mansion was apparently doing the trick. Literally.

Carol tapped her watch. “We’ll see about that Director Furry.”

Nick rolled his eyes. “That’s imaginative.”

***

23 minutes to go

“I know they’re just stuffed animals but doesn’t it feel like they’re watching us?” Peter asked as he flopped back against one of the giant pandas. His gaze kept jumping about the room towards the other silent shapes in the darkness.

“Wouldn’t surprise me if they were,” Darcy muttered as she drew shapes against the carpet. “This is so boring,” she muttered. “Come on!” she complained. “Do something!” Her voice echoed around the room. It was getting to the point where she was starting to miss the scarecrows. At least that was exciting.

The room began to light up. Wall sconces began to appear, their glows small and soft but filling the room with pale light and space as everything was illuminated. At the same time, a kind of violet smoke began to waft around the room. Both Darcy and Peter leapt to their feet, backs to each other as they watched the smoke move around the stuffed animals, forming a ring around the two humans.

“You had to say something.” Peter groaned.

“I didn’t know it was going to do that!” Darcy complained.

_“Welcome,”_ Loki’s voice sounded serene and soft as the smoke continued to build, “_to your opportunity for freedom. I must offer you my congratulations for making this far. This challenge holds an opportunity for you and your friends to escape the mansion and rejoin the game.”_ Darcy and Peter looked to each other hopefully._ “But it will not be easy. These six doors hold the key to your escape.”_ Darcy and Peter watched as six doors appeared around the room. _“You will answer six riddles between the two of you. There will be no conferring. Only one of you can work out the answer to the riddle.”_

The six doors began to open. Behind each one, she could see fellow hunters, some of them still in their rickety compartments. Tony was trapped within his, positioned horizontally over a large cloud of rainbow coloured gases which he was already starting to inhale reluctantly. Through another door she could see Gamora being held above a black, white and gold vortex which was spinning faster and faster. Inside another door, Darcy could see a great pool of green and orange slime. Bruce sat in the middle of it though he was hunched over and expanding in width and height, turning as green as some of the slime.

“Hulk’s coming out,” Peter hissed anxiously. “Shit.”

Behind another door was a field full of slingshots, each one holding a tomato, ready to be launched. Every one of them was pointed at a scarecrow, only it wasn’t really a scarecrow. It was Groot fastened to a stand. A great timer hung above his head, ready to begin.

“I mean that one’s not too bad,” Peter argued though he was frowning very deeply. “It’s just going to be messy.”

Darcy tried to cover her mouth to stop the laugh coming out when she saw what was behind the next door but failed. Quill was shivering in an icy room. He had been stripped down and wore a scarlet, slinky nightdress with black stockings and a thin black robe. His lips were painted scarlet and false lashes fluttered over his eyes. Darcy’s laughter exploded ou of her, along with Peter Parker’s.

“Oh man, the poor dude!” Peter laughed as Darcy giggled away.

The last door showed Happy with various types of fruit strapped to his clothes and fake beard. He seemed to be in a dark cavern. Dozens of bats hung around him, eyeing up their prize. Happy was looking around them with some trepidation.

“At least they’re not vampire bats,” Peter mused.

“Yeah,” Darcy said.

_“You will now receive the riddles. Once the riddles begin, your friends will be subjected to their surroundings,”_ Loki’s voice explained. _“So it’s in their best interests to think fast. For every riddle that you answer correctly, one of your friends will be freed to the maze. For every answer you get wrong, they will be trapped inside their room until the end of the game. Good luck.”_

Darcy looked at Peter with a frown. “Any good at riddles?”

“Fair,” Peter answered with a large swallow.

“Great,” Darcy murmured.

_“What has many keys, but can't even open a single door?”_ came the first riddle. Darcy and Peter looked at each other. However a light appeared above Darcy’s head.

“Guess it’s me then,” Darcy said. She began to step around the room. In the background, she heard cries of confusion and protest,, the squelching of tomatoes hitting Groot in the face, the roar of the hulk, the chattering and angry muttering of Quill and the shouts of Happy as well as the flapping of bat wings. Tony was making lots of fascinated sounds like “Ooohs” and “Ahhhs,” and the occasional, “That’s so funky.” When Darcy glanced in on him, he seemed to be in a world of his own. Hallucinations, maybe?

“Um,” Darcy tried to focus on the question. “Something with loads of keys but can’t open a door. What other kinds of keys are there?” As she voiced her thoughts, she felt her aunt pop up in her memories, the time when she’d tried to teach Darcy piano. How she’d pestered the younger Darcy not to call them switches but keys. “A piano?” Darcy asked.

There was a distant roar as Bruce’s doorway disappeared. Darcy wondered whether it was such a good idea to let the Hulk run riot in the maze.

_“Excellent,”_ Loki’s voice said. _“Peter Parker, here is your first riddle. A woman shoots her husband. Then she holds him under water for over 5 minutes. Finally, she hangs him. But 5 minutes later they both go out together and enjoy a wonderful dinner together. How can this be?”_

“What?!” Peter protested. “What even is that…?” he began to pace around the room quickly, muttering quietly to himself.

Darcy took the chance to check in on everyone as she thought about the answer to the riddle. It couldn’t mean shoot in the literal sense but how many other kinds of shoot were there? She looked at Tony’s door. He was kneeling down in the cloud of gases, laughing himself silly about something. Gamora was spinning wildly in the vortex and swearing. Her words kept getting disjointed by the change in direction. Happy was trying to shake off the dozens of bats that surrounded him. Groot’s legs were covered in squashed tomato now and Quill was moving around the room, shivering and shouting a bunch of obscenities. Darcy turned her attention back to the riddle.

Shooting but not shooting. Hanging but not hanging. Dunking but not drowning. No one could survive being dunked for five consecutive minutes. The answer teased at the back of Darcy’s mind, like she should know the answer. But it remained just out of her reach.

Peter’s pacing was growing even worse as the minutes passed.

Finally he stopped. “His wife’s a photographer. She took his picture, developed it in and then hung it to dry,” he snapped his fingers.

_“Very good,”_ Loki’s voice purred. Groot’s doorway vanished. _“Now, Darcy, back to you. Poor people have it. Rich people need it. If you eat it, you die. What is it?”_

“Damn,” Darcy whistled. “Damn that’s… um…. Well I mean rich people always say they need more money. Poor people have some money, and I guess if you try and eat money, you can choke and die.” As she spoke the words, they seemed to make less and less sense to her.

There was a long pause.

_“Darcy, that was incorrect. The correct answer was nothing. Now one of your friends will remain here until the end of the game.”_ As Darcy groaned, Quill’s doorway lifted up by itself and carried away. Darcy grimaced at the thought of Quill being stuck in those clothes for a while longer.

Chunks of ice appeared out of the space above Darcy’s head, raining down on her. She squeaked as the freezing blocks ran down her top as well as hit her repeatedly in the shoulder. Some of them gathered in the brim of her top hat. The rain continued on for several minutes, by which time there were many ice blocks spread out across the floor. Peter had already backed up away from them. He gave Darcy a weak smile and a thumbs up. She folded her arms and looked around.

_“Peter,”_ Loki spoke again, “_this next one is for you. Get it right and save a friend or condemn them to the losing side._” Peter straightened up, looking uncomfortable and even less confident than he did before. _“Always in you, sometimes on you. If I surround you, I can kill you. What am I?”_

Peter thought about that for only a minute or so before he looked up and snapped his fingers. “Water.”

_“Correct,”_ Loki’s voice said. Tony’s doorway disappeared. Darcy saw Peter looking very relieved about that. _“Darcy, your turn. A man wanted to enter an exclusive club but did not know the password that was required. He waited by the door and listened. A club member knocked on the door and the doorman said, "twelve." The member replied, "six " and was let in. A second member came to the door and the doorman said, "six." The member replied, "three" and was let in. The man thought he had heard enough and walked up to the door. The doorman said ,"ten" and the man replied, "five." But he was not let in. What should have he said?”_

Darcy pulled a face. It was both long and mathematical, two annoying kinds of riddles. She sighed and rubbed the back of her neck, pushing away a stray ice cub. She swept off her hat and let the ice fall out of the brim onto the ground. She then replaced it on her head. She thought each number through. The answers seemed to be half of what the doorman’s numbers were. Darcy smiled as she thought about how much easier this riddle was. She opened her mouth to speak and then realised it was too easy. That was way too simple a premise for the riddle. It couldn’t just be maths, maybe that was part of the trick, to seem like it was maths. But really it was not. So Darcy turned away and began to think harder. What other numbers could there be? How could the numbers be connected to something different? What was special about the numbers before besides them being half of the other?

In her head, she took the words apart and began to examine them. She separated the letters and then gasped. There were six letters in twelve and three in six. No wonder the other customer had lost. The answer slotted into place. “He should have said three. That’s how many letters there are in ten.”

She watched as Happy’s doorway disappeared. She saw the relief flood through Peter’s face.

“Thank god for that. Happy would never have let me live it down if that was my question,” he said.

_“Peter, the final riddle is for you,”_ Loki’s voice directed to the formerly Black Widow spider.

“Gamora’s counting on you.” Darcy told him.

“Thanks.” Peter grumbled. He turned around and faced the final doorway.

_“You can carry it everywhere you go and it does not get heavy, what is it?”_ Loki’s voice asked.

Peter went quiet, so quiet that Darcy hoped that he had some good theories about this riddle. She was about to think on the riddle herself when another thought came to her, a far more troubling thought. This game was designed to potentially help their friends and teammates out. But Loki had said nothing about them getting out of the mansion at all. Damn! Darcy cursed inwardly to herself. They might have got a few of the others out but they were going to be stuck here themselves. Darcy had to bite back the urge to tell Peter this. They had to give him his best chance at helping Gamora.

“Um, your heart?” Peter offered Loki.

Silence.

_“The correct answer is your name,”_ said Loki. Gamora’s door began to float away out of sight.

“Damn,” Peter said. “But… I mean…we got some of them out,” he said looking at Darcy with a bright smile. She returned it with a grin. It was hard not to buy into this human puppy’s optimism and energy sometimes. He looked back round the room. Slowly his expression began to change. “But… what happens to us?” he seemed to realise.

_“You both go for a swim,”_ Loki said, as the floor gave way under them.

***

20 minutes to go

Carol evaluated the situation. Steve and Nick were both waiting for her at the entrance to the copse, filling up the space between the hedges that led to the pathways of the maze. If she ran forwards, she wouldn’t make it past either of them without being caught and taken to the mansion. Carol looked at her Stark watch. The game was so close to finishing. She was so close to completing the whole thing without capture.

She looked at the two men. Nick was watching her with a knowing smile. Steve was chuckling as he watched her. She had the advantage that only one of those men knew her and even then, she reckoned that she could still surprise him.

Carol directed her attention briefly all around her. Her Stark watch was counting down the last twenty seconds before she would need to move. Maybe if she waited, they would come in and get her. She would still have to get around them but she might be able to slip around them. 10… 9…. 8….7…. 6…..5….

Out of the corner of her eye, Carol looked towards where the sloping grass met the tall green hedge of the maze. Her analytical mind got to work. I could climb that. Easily. She averted her gaze away from the hedge and back towards the two men. She would have to act fast and hope for the best.

3…2….1

Carol ran forward. Nick and Steve moved in sync, closer to her, reaching out to grab her. Carol darted left at the last second and ran up a short slope on the bank of the river, leaping from it onto the hedge. The hedge roughly bit into her fingers as she pulled herself up bit by bit. She heard the men hurrying up behind her. She scrambled to the top of the hedge and leaped at once, across the pathway onto the next one.

She chanced a look behind her. Steve was trying to drag himself up the hedge but Nick had already started running back around to the path. Carol jumped again, from one hedge to the other, until she was already several pathways away. She leaped down at once and kept running.

“Yes,” she whispered to herself, laughing as she heard Nick cursing.<p>

***

10 minutes to go

Darcy sank beneath the surface of the water as soon as she hit it. The first thing she was aware of was how tropically blue everything was. Colourful underwater plants and rocks gathered together in bunches. There were no fish around. Everything was still and beautiful. She kicked her legs and reached the surface, gasping for air.

“Peter!” she shouted as she treaded water to keep herself afloat. “Peter!”

Above water, everything was dark. The water was luminescent, providing the only light in the room. Darcy submerged again and looked around her. No sign of Peter.

She resurfaced again. “Peter!” she shouted. She checked her Stark watch. Ten minutes to get out of here. She wondered if Peter could swim. She hoped he could. But where was he? “Peter!” she shouted as she fell beneath the water’s surface again. Something was pulling at her legs and she looked down. Nothing could be seen. She kicked out and reached the surface again. “Peter!” she shouted.

“There’s nobody else here,” a young, female voice spoke from behind Darcy. Darcy moved herself around. A golden haired young woman floated in front of her, on her back. Darcy followed her gaze from her tranquil, doll-like face, down to a gold corset and, to Darcy’s astonishment, a sapphire blue tail. The girl grinned when she watched Darcy taking her in. “Yup, I’m a mermaid. Go on,” she said, suddenly moving through the water. She swam around Darcy as easily as if the water was guiding her, “bask in it. The name’s Halia,” she said.

“D-Darcy,” Darcy said as she struggled to keep herself afloat. There was a strange heaviness in her legs. “Have you not seen Peter? He fell with me.”

Halia straightened up so she was treading water with her tail. “He must have gone somewhere else. Loki likes to do things like that.” She looked over Darcy. “You’ve been sent here to stay until the rest of the game,” she declared.

Darcy didn’t know what was wrong with her feet but they just couldn’t keep her afloat very well.

“I… can’t… stay… like this…” she said between dunks of her lower face in the water.

Halia frowned at her. “No you can’t.” She dived underwater. Darcy felt her swimming around her legs. Halia then returned to the surface. “He’s such a trickster,” she rolled her eyes. “I can get you to safety,” she told her, “help you escape the mansion.”

Darcy pushed herself away from the mermaid. “Why would you do something like that?”

Halia smiled mischievously. “Well Loki won’t like it. So there’s that,” she said.

Darcy smiled too. “Sure.”

“I dunno,” Halia said. “I guess I’d just like to see you get a win. Plus Loki would never expect me to help you. That might surprise him. He thinks I’m jealous of every woman who goes near him. That might have been true about nine centuries ago but it’s not now.” Darcy tried to laugh or comment her approval but she was sinking into the water again now. Halia saw that and swam behind her, arms lifting her above the surface. “Right, come with me.”

She submerged, pulling Darcy with her. But instead of feeling breathless, Darcy felt oxygen pour into her from the touch of the mermaid’’s hands over her own. Halia began to navigate them through the waters. A great cylinder opened up beneath them and Halia steered them into it. As soon as they entered a navy coloured pipe, they began to pick up speed, so much so that Darcy’s mind was a rush of dizziness and distorted shades of blue as they progressed faster and faster through the pipe.

After a few minutes, Halia pushed them both upwards, through another cylinder and suddenly they were breaking the surface.

They’d come out in a small square pond, surrounded by an exotic rock garden. Wrapped around that was the expanse of a cobblestone courtyard and lines of pine trees in the distance. Darcy swam forward and took hold of the edge of the pond, looking out over the view. She could see the golden afternoon sky above the trees and she could hear the shouts and laughter coming from the maze in the distance.

“I’m out,” Darcy murmured and turned to Halia. “Thanks.” She climbed out of the pond. The mermaid watched her with a nod and a grin. “You were awesome,” Darcy told her.

“I think I was,” Halia laughed and winked. “You’re more than welcome.” She flopped onto her back, hands behind her head. “You better get back in that maze quickly,” she added.

“You should probably get going too,” Darcy said. “I won’t tell Loki you helped me.”

“That’d be appreciated,” said Halia. “It was nice to rescue you…?”

“Darcy,” said Darcy. “Nice to meet you too.”

Halia winked at her before diving back beneath the surface and disappearing, leaving Darcy shivering above the surface.

Darcy took a moment to catch her breath fully, looking around the courtyard. It looked like it had come from one of those rustic country manors in Italy or something. Except for the massive ass spiders web dangling from the corner of a door leading into the side of a mansion. The web itself, though, large, looked pretty abandoned. Darcy didn’t see any sign of an occupant there. At least not at first. Seconds after laying eyes on the web, she saw two glowing green eyes materialise out of the shadows the web stood in. The eyes were quickly followed by the shape of a massive, jade green spider.

Feeling sick and creepily reminded of the Cheshire Cat, Darcy took a step away from the door.

To make matters worse, the door opened. One at a time, four scarecrow stepped out, their hands still alight with that fiery energy. They turned to face Darcy in unison.

“Oh man,” Darcy said, just before she took off.

***

8 minutes to go

“HULK HIDE!” Hulk roared as he and Tony raced into the maze once more, free of the mansion.

Tony gave his former science bro a speculative look. “For one thing, you’re big and green now so I think you can forget it. For another, you’re dropping slime,” he said, taking a few extra steps away from him. “Why don’t you go that way?” he pointed down one path. “And I’ll go this way,” he began to retreat down another path.

Hulk watched him with an expression like a petulant child. “FINE!” he shouted. “You go hide in second layer!” he called after Tony who stopped where he was.

_Great,_ Tony thought, _just announce where I am, why don’t you, you big freak?_ “Seriously?” he muttered. “Why does he have to turn into a big green dick?” Tony retraced his steps and took a completely different pathway to the one Hulk had outed. He quickly began moving through the maze, ducking out of sight where possible and listening for the sounds of movements on the other sides of the walls. In particular, he tried to keep an ear out for Pepper’s movements.

Soon enough he heard hurried footsteps behind him. Tony immediately cursed his luck and turned down a left pathway that ended in a dead end. Tony turned, resigned to his fate, only to find himself facing Peter Parker who was now spiderless and very static-y as he stopped to catch his breath. “Whoa, what happened to you, kid?” Tony asked, pulling Peter off the main pathway and into the small nook beside him. “Do you know if any of the others got out of the mansion yet?”

“Dunno,” Peter panted. “Darcy and I got separated. No wait. You and Bruce, Groot and Happy.” He gave Tony a short rundown of the game in the mansion.

Tony whistled approvingly. “Nice job, kid. Now we just got to get to a safe zone.”

***

5 minutes to go

The first fiery blast missed Darcy by milimetres. It scorched a patch of hedge as Darcy re-entered the maze. Darcy picked up as much pace as she could. The scarecrows moved pretty quickly but they weren’t great at sharp turns or anything. So naturally Darcy threw lots of them into the mix as she delved deeper and deeper into the maze.

The further Darcy ran, the more conscious she became of the many hunters still in play. In the distance, she saw the Hulk crashing through the fence, yelling and attracting the attention of many of the hunters. She saw Wanda, Pietro and Drax move in on the Hulk. Darcy couldn’t help but grin. He may be putting himself at risk of going back in the mansion but he was definitely taking one for the team.

Darcy began hurrying towards the pyramid. As the seconds ticked away and the sounds of hunters advancing on her increased, Darcy burst into a full out sprint. The scarecrows were still out there. Every so often she glimpsed fiery magic bursting into something, out of the corner of her eye. The maze too, seemed back on form. Darcy had to leap over a hole that appeared in the ground, duck under a thick branch that materialized and almost decapitated her.

Finally she burst around a corner, yards away from the safety of the pyramid. At the same time, Pepper appeared, moving out from behind one hedge wall, arms outstretched, to catch Darcy. Darcy ducked down, threw herself beneath Pepper’s arm and landed, hands and feet on the floor, scrambling up into the safety of the pyramid just in time.

“Yes!” Erik cheered as he grabbed Darcy and pulled her in. Bucky smiled over at Darcy. Groot was there too. “Well done, Darcy!” Erik declared. “We’ve done it, we survived.”

Darcy slumped down against the wall, closing her eyes as all of her energy began to drain from her. That was it, it was almost over. No more running.

“How many of us are out?” she asked Bucky.

“Less than half, I think,” he said grimly. “I don’t know though. We need more than half to win.”

“We’ll find out soon enough,” said Erik. “Anyway Darcy can meet our new friend here,” he said. He stretched his legs out in front of him and a black cat raised its head from where it had been lying next to him. Darcy immediately straightened up.

“Oh hello!” she cooed to the silky looking creature. It had one green eye, one brown and it trotted over to Darcy who proceeded to give it a great deal of stroking and lifted it into her arms. The cat immediately shifted and wriggled out of her grasp. Darcy remembered that she was still soaking from the unexpected swim. “Sorry, kitty, my bad.” The cat gave her a judging look and sat nearby watching her. “Where’d it come from?” she asked Erik.

“Dunno. She’s been wandering around the place all game. Cats were connected to Egyptian Mythology.” Erik mused.

Darcy laughed. “Something from Egyptian mythology living it up in Norse land?”

Erik shrugged. “The Norse guys were true. Anything’s possible at this point, Darcy.”

Darcy looked out towards the maze and activity going on within it. “Yeah I suppose that’s true. I mean this is the craziest game I’ve ever played.”

“Same,” Bucky said. “But it’s been fun.”

“Yeah,” Darcy and Erik said.

***********

A great whistle cut through the air, signaling the end of the game. A wave of magic swept over the arena, deactivating the traps. Lady Sif and Fandral went into the mansion to retrieve and count the hunted that had been captured. Volstagg counted those who had been on the way to the mansion and Hogun counted those who had escaped capture and/or the mansion. Once they’d all been counted, everyone headed out of the maze and back towards the tents where Loki and Thor were waiting.

Thor gathered the hunted together in one group. “You all did a fantastic job!” he enthused. “Some of you even managed to avoid being captured at all. That was incredible, well done.” He directed these words to Natasha, Bucky, Erik and Carol. “Some of you escaped the mansion and achieved safety until the end.” He looked at Darcy, Peter, Tony, Bruce, Groot and Happy. Then he looked towards the others. “To those who weren’t as fortunate, I am no less proud. My brother set no easy challenges here and everyone did their best.”

“That was… really fun,” Gamora smiled and then eyed Peter Parker, “even if some of us need to brush up on riddles,” she teased with a mock deadpan look in her eyes. Peter blushed and said nothing.

“Yeah,” Darcy said. “But man I couldn’t have kept playing it. Two hours was enough.”

“Definitely,” Bucky and Natasha agreed. the hunters. “The numbers are in brother,” he said. He allowed many seconds of silence as he clasped a piece of paper in his hand, smirking slightly as he looked around at all of their expectant faces. “Congratulations are in order. 10 out of 13 of your hunted had evaded capture or escaped the mansion by the end of the game. Therefore the victory is yours.”

“Yes!” Thor cheered along with his group. Hugs and claps on the shoulders were exchanged and people began breaking away to talk to people on the opposite team.

Darcy backed away from the others, moving to find a bench to sit on, thankful that it was all over. As she settled down, she saw Loki approach her.

“You were one of the most interesting people to watch in that mansion,” he told her. “Your explorations were very thorough. I admit I did not anticipate your escape,” he added, smiling at her. Darcy tried not to show the guilt on her face at being helped into escaping. Inwardly, she smiled as she thought of Haria.

“Yeah, well I was leaving nothing to chance when it came to you,” Darcy laughed tiredly. “As for the escaping, I just got lucky.”

“You certainly did,” Loki told her with a glint in his eyes.

Volstagg moved away from the crowd. “It’s time to return to the city. I think everyone here has earned a rest and a place at the table for our magnificent feast!”

A great roar of approval spread through the crowd. Darcy laughed and chatted along with them as they moved to the boats. This had to be the best Halloween ever.


	5. Tunnel of Spooks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tasertricks drabble featuring some Asgardian tunnels

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was my first ever attempt at a drabble so I'm a bit nervous about posting it up. It's good to actually get a Spooktober prompt chapter finished on the actual day it's meant for instead of combining loads of them into a long short.

“I love you but I’m terrified right now.” Darcy whispered into the darkness of the Asgardian tunnels, the damp creeping into her nostrils. “Why did I agree to this again?”

“You decided it would be ‘spooktacular’.” Loki murmured. He lifted his hand, the movement invisible. Candles flickered into existence, their lights dancing.

A powerful wind whooshed through Darcy, filling her with ice. Feelings of torment battered at her heart and mind.

Loki’s arm pulled her closer to his body. Pulses of magic soaked into her, chasing the anguish away.

“The Ancient Spirits can’t harm you, Darcy, not while I’m here.”


End file.
